Amanda Andersson

Fatigue is one of the most common symptoms of Post COVID-19 Condition (PCC), yet it remains pathophysiologically and phenomenologically enigmatic. This article investigates the affective dimensions of PCC fatigue from within qualitative phenomenology and biomedicine, engaging in a non-reductionist dialogue across these strands. The article is comprised of a qualitative phenomenological analysis of lived experiences of fatigue in PCC; rehabilitation medicine (physician, physiotherapy, neuropsychology) assessments; brain MRI analysis; an analysis of inflammatory mediators in blood, and a cross-reading of results from these assessments and analyses, in relation to each other. The qualitative phenomenological analysis is foregrounded, and identifies four affective modes: an affective mode in which patients wanted but had no capability or energy to engage with others and the world; a mode characterised by a lessened or lack of affective pull; a mode characterised by an assault-like feeling, and a mode characterized by a felt sense of “being in a bubble” or “being under water”. The article sheds light on affective dimensions of PCC that are unlikely to be identified in everyday clinical practice, and the discussion across results from phenomenology and biomedical assessments and analyses brings out additional nuances in the understanding of the affective dimensions of fatigue.

This article contributes to the current debate on human embryonic stem cell researchers’ possible complicity in the destruction of human embryos and the relevance of such complicity for the issue of commodification of human embryos. I will discuss if, and to what extent, researchers who destroy human embryos, and researchers who merely use human embryos destroyed by others, have moral use rights, and/or moral property rights, in these embryos. I argue that the moral status of the human embryo, however justified, places few restrictions on the latter researchers’ use of it, and property rights in it, once it is destroyed. I argue that the former researchers have no property rights in the destroyed embryo but use rights in it to the extent allowed by the legitimate owners of the destroyed embryo. I discuss the implications of this account for previous and current US federal law regulating human embryonic stem cell research.