Does anyone have any opinions as to whether a keto or carni WOE helps a quicker recovery from covid, and / or decreases chances of long covid? I would imagine the answer to be yes because covid is linked to a huge inflammatory response and the keto etc WOE are good at decreasing inflammation. Does anyone have any experience with this?
Keto and covid recovery
SomeGuy
(Joey)
#2
I agree that your hypothesis (re: inflammation effects) makes sense, but have come across no compelling evidence to support it.
Fortunately, I lack direct experience… except for the n=2 observation that my wife and I stick with low-carb, got our vaccines, and despite multiple air travel visits, have never contracted any of the coronavirus strains (to our knowledge).
Having said that, there are a number of folks on this forum who are low-carb and COVID victims - whether their cases could/would/should’ve been worse if not low-carb is impossible to know. 
kib1
(KM)
#3
DH and I have both had covid twice, even though we were vaccinated. He’s carby and I’m close to carnivore. He was utterly miserable the first time and pretty sick the second time, and I didn’t know I had covid at all, except I suddenly lost my sense of smell and felt a bit tired. This is totally anecdotal and it could be pure coincidence or some other luck on my part, but I credit my diet / my good health due to the diet in part for my less intense symptoms.
lfod14
#4
Yes, but only that it was a joke of a cold that wasn’t worth the hype for the majority. Having low inflammation will definitely help either way as we know without question that’s gas on the fire, especially for those with compromised immune systems. I had it twice, wouldn’t have known either time since it just seems you’re “normal sick”. I only got checked the first time because my throat was sore and strept was going around my kids school so wanted to make sure it wasn’t that.
lfod14
#5
I’d bet my whopping life savings you’ve had it! Don’t assume you’d know it from any other cold, if you’re healthy, you wouldn’t. No way to prove it since you’ve been vaccinated. Aside from maybe the breakdown of antibodies, vacinated people that haven’t had it are pretty specific, whereas people that weren’t and built their own supposedly have a much larger variety of antibodies to it, but not a perfect thing to look at either.
SomeGuy
(Joey)
#6
I wouldn’t take that bet. It would seem unfair to take your life savings on what’s probably a 50/50 coin toss 
Geezy56
(Geoffrey)
#7
I have no personal experience since the only time I’ve been sick was one time back at Christmas in 22. I had flu like symptoms so I’m assuming it was the flu but I don’t know because I never got tested because I have no desire to be another government statistic to fuel their propaganda. I’ve never worn a mask and I’ve never gotten their so called “vaccine” that isn’t a vaccine. My illness was the mildest flu I’ve ever had. Ok, off my soapbox and back to the answer.
I do have a friend who just a few weeks ago claims that him and his whole household came down with the China flu and that everyone except him were very sick and miserable for a week or so. He is the only one in his household that is carnivore and he reported that he only had mild symptoms for three days and was able to be active around the house taking care of everyone else with no problems.
FrankoBear
#8
I always thought it would help. But it was difficult to discern.
Naturally I fasted and stayed low-carb. Still felt pretty crook, though. Also have some long-COVID. Caught the infection in June 2022. Had had 3 vaccinations. Actually felt worse from the vaccine reactions than I did from the disease. As @lfod14 characterizes it, it was a dud cold for many people.
My thoughts on inflammation, is that with an infection you do want a strong inflammatory response to fight the infection, so the fever, as long as it is not prolonged or dangerous is a welcome part of the experience at the start. Then low inflammation eating post-infection is good so that any inflammation settles down and does not become chronic.
Anyhow, for what it is worth, I tracked the acute COVID infection for 2 weeks while eating a carnivore diet
Shinita
#9
I have no idea if my SO and I got covid but we were a tiny bit sick (some not too bad cold, well it lasted for more than 3 days so it’s as a serious sickness as I can get, I don’t have that level every decade) and it’s possibly was covid. It was mild and very similar for both of us. He is health-conscious too with a good immune system, lacks a spleen and eats HCHF though. He is about as healthy as I am, sometimes I feel he is a tiny bit healthier… But he is more active too. And my colds barely have symptoms, it’s a tad harder on him. But I chalk it up to personal factors, definitely not our diets (well beyond that we both get plenty of nutrition for our bodies to work well. obviously some super crappy diet would make one weak and vulnerable but we never ate so wrong). I never had any sickness for 15 years before keto either (first half was high-carb, the second low-carb)… I am not prone to overestimate keto. Diets are highly important for health, sure but good genes and a great immune system can protect us even if we eat a ton of carbs while our body prefers carnivore (as mine seemingly does. or something very, very close). Of course, it’s best to have good genes, a good immune system, proper exercise and the best possible diet too! My SO is thriving on HCHF and not anywhere else as far as he could test it so I suppose he uses a good diet too, for him, just a carby one.
We both got 3 vaccines, ages ago (he had some usual after-vaccine symptoms afterwards, no big deal, I got nothing beyond a mild sensitivity of the area for a tiny while, I suppose that can’t be avoided or it must be super rare). I never was tested, he was but not when we both got that cold-like thing.
I googled a bit as I never know what is the difference between cold and flu. Okay, so I never had the flu, apparently, just milder colds. And possibly covid with very mild cold symptoms.
PaulL
(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing)
#10
There is some evidence to show that the risk of the cytokine storm is less on a low-carb diet. Also, a diet that reduces inflammation puts us way ahead in terms of severity of infection and speed of recovery.
That said, I doubt that a keto diet will prevent infection in everyone. I had a pretty bad bout of it, and if that was the milder strain (omega), then I’d have hated to have the original. However, while I often don’t catch what other people are coming down with, when I do catch it, I’m usually sicker than most people. So perhaps being keto for five years at the time prevented me from getting even sicker, who knows?
It was mostly the fever that bothered me, however; my respiration was fine. Afterward, it took a good six months before I stopped getting migraines, my sense of taste returned to normal, and my strength and stamina returned to pre-Covid levels. I wore a mask throughout the lockdown, not to keep from getting the virus, but to keep from passing it on unknowingly to others.
I do know that going carnivore when I broke my ankle seems to have sped up the healing process. The surgeon was quite pleased with how well and how quickly the bones healed–ankle injuries are often quite slow to heal. I can’t definitively say how much carnivore helped, but I do notice that my nails and hair have started growing considerably faster since I went carnivore. I also notice that the nerve damage from Lyme disease seems to have mostly healed, when a lot of people find that the pain is permanent.
0cac544b99285298bde6
(Eve)
#11
Reading the replies indicates that there may be something helpful in the carni or keto WOE regarding recovery from covid. But as is often stated here , everyone’s body is different in terms of how we react to different things. I would think though that if one’s health is better, inflammation improved, etc, through these WOE, then it can only be helpful in recovery from any insult to the body.
lfod14
#12
Sadly, most did that I’ve talked to, both me and my wife had long COVID symptoms, both our docs (different doc’s in different practices) put us on NAD+ and Glutathione for a couple weeks…GONE! Seems that’s the go-to treatment, as long as you’re not a mainstream doc. Ours are optimization docs that do anti-aging, peptides, HRT etc.
