A new study has identified the main factors that make it more likely that patients will suffer long term from the coronavirus.

A new analysis by researchers at King's College London, using data from the COVID Symptom Study app, shows that 1 in 20 people with Covid-19 are likely to suffer symptoms for at least eight weeks.

The researchers also found that people reporting a wide range of initial symptoms were more likely to develop long Covid, as were people with asthma, although there were no clear links to any other underlying health conditions.

As for the commonly reported symptoms of long Covid, the research identified two main symptom groupings; One was dominated by respiratory symptoms such as a cough and shortness of breath, fatigue and headaches.

The researchers have used their findings to develop a model that can predict who is most at risk of long Covid by looking at an individual's age, gender and count of early symptoms.

The King's researchers found that while most people with Covid reported being back to normal in 11 days or less, around 1 in 7 (13.3%, 558 users) had symptoms lasting for at least four weeks, with around 1 in 20 (4.5%, 189 users) staying ill for eight weeks and 1 in 50 (2.3%, 95 users) suffering for longer than 12 weeks?