At this stage of the pandemic, when most people have been vaccinated several times and treatments are available, it’s tempting to forget about the virus. In my view, Long COVID is among the most compelling reasons not to. Millions of people have developed long-lasting, sometimes debilitating symptoms after getting infected, even if they were vaccinated or had a mild case.

And, according to a new report from the National Center for Health Statistics, Long COVID contributed to more than 3,500 U.S. deaths from January 2020 to June 2022. The report doesn’t go into much detail about how these people died (the research was based on death-certificate data, which tells a limited story), but experts told me Long COVID may have caused or exacerbated conditions including organ damage, heart disease, and blood clots.

To keep things in perspective, the 3,500 deaths mentioned in the report account for less than 1% of fatalities attributed to COVID-19 in the first 30 months of the pandemic. But that number may be an undercount, since lots of people aren’t properly diagnosed with Long COVID or suffer complications that aren’t obviously linked to their initial COVID-19 cases. And any number of unnecessary deaths is a tragedy—especially when we have tools, like masks and vaccines, that can help prevent illnesses in the first place.

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