The North East GP learning to live with her own health conditions after Covid

Meeting Dr Susannah Thompson at her home in Northumberland and it is clear that over the past two years, life has changed for her completely.

The person who once enjoyed cold water swimming and amateur dramatics must now think carefully before embarking on gentle physical activity.

Susannah now lives with the debilitating effects of Long Covid and uses a wheelchair to get around.

She says: "I've gone from somebody who used to jump up, go for a swim in the sea before work, always running around with the kids.

"To someone who struggles to get out of bed before midday."

Susannah contracted Covid in April 2020, soon after the start of the first lockdown.

At the time, she was part of the NHS response to the pandemic, seeing patients with the condition.

After a degree of recovery, she returned to her job, but last September she collapsed and has not been able to work since.

Among her many symptoms are fatigue, a racing heart as well as chest and joint pain.

Looking back, Susannah says that for a long time, she tried to "push through", but this simply made her condition worse. She has now learned to listen to her body and does as much as she feels able.

As well as forcing her to give up work, Long Covid has brought enormous changes to her family life, with her husband and two young daughters all stepping up to support her.

Susannah says that her medical knowledge has been invaluable in helping her to cope, because she understands what is happening to her body.

Even so, she has been shocked and surprised by the condition; for example, when she was struck by "brain fog" and struggled to remember her own name.

In January, the Office for National Statistics estimated that 1.3 million people were experiencing Long Covid.

Since the start of the outbreak, clinics have been set up across the region - and countrywide - to support those living with the condition.

The Department of Health and Social Care told us it is providing more than £50m to fund studies into its symptoms and possible treatments.

Susannah Thompson says support for patients is vital.

She said: It's affecting a lot of working-age people, a lot of people with families, people who are trying their very best to get on with it, but at some point, something has to give.

"It does decimate people's lives. People are losing their houses, losing their jobs, losing their lives and you meet a lot of people who are in a very dark place because of Long Covid."

She has become a champion for the charity Long Covid Kids, arguing there is too little recognition, in particular, for the challenges facing young people with the condition.

As for her own future, Susannah Thompson cannot predict what it will hold, or whether she will ever be able to return to work.

She says she would love to go on holiday with her children and run on the beach with them, however almost two years after her Covid infection, she cannot say whether that dream will ever be possible.