Publication date: Dec 10, 2025
Background: Severe COVID-19 results in substantial economic burden and impacts quality of life. Assessing how non-hospitalized COVID-19 impacts health utilities during acute infection and long term is important to estimate the full economic impact of SARS-CoV-2 infection. Methods: We analyzed EQ-5D-3L survey data from SARS-CoV-2 infected adults (aged at least 16 years) and children (aged 8-15 years) from three community and household cohorts in the United States (2020-2022). EQ-5D-3L scores were analyzed at three time points after symptom onset or first positive SARS-CoV-2 test result and converted to health utilities on a scale of 0-1 (1=perfect health). Among adults, regression models were used to compare differences in health utility by demographic/clinical characteristics. Results: Among 538 SARS-CoV-2 non-hospitalized asymptomatic/symptomatic infections from 575 adults with EQ-5D-3L surveys, mean utilities were near 1 throughout the observation period. During 0-14 days, vaccinated participants had higher health utilities (Beta:0.57, 95% CI:0.07,1.07). Seeking medical care and having gastrointestinal symptoms (vs. none), were associated with lower health utilities (Beta, 95% CI:-0.96, -1.60, -0.31; and -0.76, -1.30, -0.21 respectively). During 15-30 days, unemployment was associated with lower health utility (Beta:-0.64, 95% CI:-1.15,-0.14). During 31-90 days, underlying conditions were associated with lower health utilities (Beta:-0.32, 95% CI:-0.54, -0.09). Results for children were similar to adults. Conclusion: Non-hospitalized COVID-19 may have minimal overall impact on quality of life; however, health utilities differed by vaccination status, presence of gastrointestinal symptoms, employment status, and presence of underlying conditions. Vaccination may play an important role in minimizing illness impact from SARS-CoV-2 infection.
| Concepts | Keywords |
|---|---|
| Competing | Adults |
| Gastrointestinal | Ci |
| July | Copyright |
| Michigan | Cov |
| Covid | |
| Hospitalized | |
| Impacts | |
| Important | |
| Infection | |
| License | |
| Medrxiv | |
| Preprint | |
| Related | |
| Sars | |
| Utilities |
Semantics
| Type | Source | Name |
|---|---|---|
| disease | MESH | SARS-CoV-2 Infection |
| pathway | REACTOME | SARS-CoV-2 Infection |
| disease | MESH | infection |
| disease | MESH | MD1 |
| disease | MESH | MHS5 |
| drug | DRUGBANK | Methylphenidate |
| disease | MESH | Influenza |
| disease | MESH | long COVID |
| disease | MESH | included |