Fig. 2: Risk factors associated with long COVID from meta-analyses of LS findings alongside corresponding analyses from EHRs.

The reference category for ‘Diabetes’, ‘Hypertension’, ‘High Cholesterol’, and ‘Asthma’ is the absence of condition. All associations were adjusted for age and sex, except where redundant. In all instances where it was possible to derive results from both meta-analyses of longitudinal studies (N up to = 6907) and analysis of EHRs (N up to = 4189), the corresponding results are plotted side-by-side for comparison. Estimates from fixed effects meta-analyses of longitudinal study data and EHR analyses are presented as odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs). The outcome used for longitudinal study analyses presented here was symptoms lasting for 4+ weeks, and the outcome in EHRs was any reporting of a long COVID read code in GP records (regardless of duration of symptoms). Full study-level results, heterogeneity statistics and random-effect estimates for the longitudinal study meta-analyses are presented in Supplementary Figs. 3 and 4. The equivalent meta-analyses of longitudinal study data where symptom duration of 12+ weeks was instead used as the outcome are depicted in Supplementary Figs. 5 and 6. Index of multiple deprivation quintile 1 represents individuals from the most deprived area, and quintile 5 represents individuals from the least deprived area. ‘Poor overall health’ represents the self-rated health exposure in the LS meta-analysis, and comorbidities in OpenSAFELY. The outcome ‘Overweight and obesity’ represents combined BMI categories over 25 in the LS, and solely individuals with BMI 30–34.9 in OpenSAFELY.