Welcome to Paging Dr. Gupta! This is the podcast where your health questions become the conversation. They drive the conversation and you've been sending in some great questions. So today, we're diving into some interesting topics that you've sent our way. And one of our producers, Kyra, who by the way is from the Midwest, like me, she has the first question ready, Kyra?

'Hey, Sanjay. So since last week marked five years since the World Health Organization declared Covid-19 as a global pandemic, we've actually had a lot of listeners asking questions about Covid. So this one's coming from Candy in Oregon, and she wants to know: what are the stats for people who have had breathing problems long after having Covid-19?

'All right, Kyra, thanks for bringing that one in. And it's a timely question for the reason you pointed out. It's been five years since we first declared Covid a pandemic. Okay, Candy, what you're describing is long Covid. You may remember in the beginning it was referred to as long haulers, but it is long Covid and it is an entirely new disease class driven by a novel virus. The Covid virus. The strict definition long Covid are symptoms that persist at least three months after infection. For some people, they say is at least six months. But Candy, as you know, as I think you're alluding to, the symptoms can last years as well. They can range from mild to severe. Some of these symptoms, like fatigue and brain fog and dizziness and sleep problems. We've heard a lot about those things taste and smell issues as well. That can be something that lingers and has been more directly linked to Covid. So these are significant issues and they can really interfere with someone's way of life. There does seem to be some correlation with the overall degree of illness initially, and the likelihood of developing long Covid, meaning that if you were sicker, long Covid may be likelier if you had some sort of underlying condition, including immune compromised or even older than the age of 65. Long Covid might be more likely as well. But there were plenty of young people and plenty of people who had mild infections initially whose symptoms simply just didn't go away. So they have long Covid as well. And, you know, it's interesting because I don't think we talk about long Covid a lot. I talk about it on this podcast. I've done a lot of reporting on it. But interestingly, as a society, given that this is an entirely new disease class, we really haven't discussed long Covid a lot, and I think that should change and hopefully it does change. You should also know that even if you don't have some of the classic symptoms of long Covid, what we're starting to learn is that if you had other conditions such as migraines or lung disease or autoimmune disease or chronic kidney disease, some of those could be worsened as well by a Covid infection. Okay? So you could have developed brand new symptoms that you never had before or a worsening of existing symptoms. Now, Candy, to your question, let me give you some numbers. And this is based on survey data, which is only as good as how well people actually answer these surveys. But about 30% of Covid infections will result in long Covid, according to that survey data. In the latest survey, which was from mid-August through mid-September, about 30% of adults said that they had Covid symptoms lasting three months or longer. So this 30% number seems to be quite stable. It looked like it was 30% a couple of years into the pandemic, and now five years into the pandemic, 30% of people do seem to have these lingering symptoms. I will say that when it comes to breathing problems, specifically, if you take that 30%, up to 40% of them seem to have some sort of persistent breathing symptoms. And it could be, you know, simply becoming more exercise intolerant, not being able to exercise as long. To quite severe, not even being able to take a few steps, without losing your breath. What seems to be happening, candy, is that there is scarring or thickening of tissues in the lung after a Covid infection, and that probably is driving some of the symptoms that you're talking about. Now, I don't want to minimize this problem, and I don't want what I'm about to say to sound overly simplistic, but when you look at the data, really engaging diligently in breathing exercises seems to have benefit. Not for everybody, but for a lot of people it seems to allow them to return to baseline lung capacity and hopefully get them back to their way of life. So, that's one thing. And the second thing, Candy, very important, do not get another infection. Because the impact of that could be more exponential than linear. So you really compound the degree of that scarring or thickening of the lung tissue, if you get another infection. So be careful. Thanks for sending in the question. And let's keep going!

Should you ditch your regular deodorant for a natural one? Hah, amazing how many questions we got about this. We're going to look at the facts, right after the break.

All right Kyra, our next page is in. Who do we have?

All right. I can honestly say I've had this question myself as I've walked down the personal care aisle. And it's coming from Laura in Houston, Texas. Take a listen.

Hi, doctor Gupta, this is Laura. Um, I was wondering if you could address all of the potential issues surrounding deodorant. I feel like all of my friends are switch, have been switching the last few years to natural deodorant, and I'm just wondering how concerned we should be about that. Um, if it's more of a correlation or causation with that and cancer? Um and if we should all be switching deodorant or if it's just well, you know, a little marketing scheme to get us pay $20 for a stick of deodorant? Um, thank you so much. I enjoy your podcast.

All right, Laura, first of all, thanks for calling in. Thanks for being a listener of the podcast. I really appreciate it. Laura, let me start with the key distinction that you may know, but just to make sure I put it out there. Deodorants and antiperspirants, oftentimes those terms are used interchangeably, but they're not completely the same thing. Think of it like this: deodorants help with body odor by neutralizing bacteria on your skin, and sometimes by adding fragrances to mask smells. But what they don't do necessarily is stop sweating. Antiperspirants go a step further. How do they do that? Well, they often contain aluminum salts, which will temporarily block sweat glands to reduce sweating. So many antiperspirants are deodorants as well. So again, there's a lot of overlap there. But just in terms of getting the terminology correct, Antiperspirants which have these aluminum salts typically versus deodorants. The reason I bring that up is because I think the big concern many people have had over the years is this idea that aluminum and antiperspirants could be linked to breast cancer or even Alzheimer's disease. Now, research on this is ongoing, but think about the type of research you have to do. You have to get thousands of people who use aluminum salt antiperspirants and compare them to people who don't, and then follow them for years to try and determine is there some difference overall in the population of people who use these products versus those who don't? So the research is ongoing, but at this point, the studies have not found a direct link between antiperspirant use and these diseases. That's where we are right now. Big organizations look at that data and weigh in on it. So the American Cancer Society, the Alzheimer's Association, they have reviewed that available evidence. And they also conclude that there's no strong proof that using antiperspirants increases your risk. So, let's talk about these natural deodorants. They usually rely on ingredients like baking soda, arrowroot powder, essential oils, mainly to help with odor. Do they work? Well, you know, that depends. I think you have to ask the people who use it, or the people around the people who use it. Again, they're not going to stop you from sweating because they don't contain those aluminum salts or not antiperspirant specifically. So if you're someone who sweats a lot, you'll probably find that they're not going to be very effective for you. They're often marked as a healthier option. But again, there's no evidence that the conventional deodorants are harmful. So, you know, I'm not sure if you can necessarily make the claim that they are healthier if the thing you're comparing it to has not been shown to show any harm. I think a more fundamental question, interestingly, is, is deodorant necessary? Well, you know, wearing deodorant is not a necessity, of course, because did you know that sweat itself doesn't actually smell? It's not the sweat that smells. The odor actually happens when bacteria breaks down the sweat on your skin. So if you're someone who doesn't sweat much or doesn't mind natural body odor, you might not need deodorant at all. You know, this reminds me of a pretty interesting conversation I had at the beginning of the year on Chasing Life with Dr. James Hamblin. He's a doctor, and he gave up showering entirely for a period of time.

Well, I think part of the reason that people have kind of wild ideas about what is really necessary to health in terms of showering and cleaning ourselves is because it's one of the areas we're still very private about, and there's still a lot of stigma around, you know, people who are perceived to not do enough. And people have very strong ideas about what needs to be done, when and for what frequency and how long. But there are lots of different ways to do things correctly. I mean, I know a lot of people who don't use deodorant don't seem to need it. And so, you know, you learn that yourself. If you, if you do, what kind of work for you, how often you need to use it, how often you need to bathe, and how often you need to use soap and shampoo in that process. It's pretty much up to you. For me, it's very minimal.

If you're curious about that episode, check out the episode called "One Doctor's Decision to Stop Showering," we'll link it in the show notes as well. So, Laura, back to you. Should you switch to a natural deodorant? That's entirely up to you. And now that you have some more data on it, you should make that decision. Figure out if it works for your budget as well, sometimes it can be more expensive. If you like the ingredients, if you like how they make you feel, go for it! Just know that the science does not necessarily sway you in one way or the direction that you have to make the switch for health reasons.

'Okay, that's it for today's episode. Keep those questions coming. I love to hear them. Record a voice memo, email it to asksanjay@cnn.com, or give us a call (470) 396-0832. Leave a message. Thanks for listening. I'll be back next Tuesday. Chasing life is a production of CNN Audio. Our podcast is produced by Eryn Mathewson, Jennifer Lai, Grace Walker, Lori Galaretta, Jesse Remedios, Sofía Sánchez, and Kyra Dahring. Andrea Kane is our medical writer. Our senior producer is Dan Bloom, Amanda Sealey is our showrunner, Dan Dzula is our technical director, and the executive producer of CNN Audio is Steve Lickteig. With support from Jamus Andrest, Jon Dianora, Haley Thomas, Alex Manasseri, Robert Mathers, Leni Steinhardt, Nichole Pesaru and Lisa Namerow. Special thanks to Ben Tinker and Nadia Kounang of CNN Health and Katie Hinman.