When it comes to exercising, current advice for people who are recovering from mild or moderate COVID-19 and who weren't hospitalized is to wait at least two weeks before resuming physical activity. Resuming physical activity after COVID-19 has an additional layer of complexity due to the potential for complications, such as myocarditis (inflammation of the heart muscle), in people known as long-distance carriers, who experience prolonged symptoms of the virus, says Dr. Michael Fredericson, professor of physical medicine and rehabilitation in the orthopedic surgery department of Stanford Medicine in Palo Alto, California. How you should start exercising after COVID-19 depends on the level of activity you were doing before, Fredericson says.
Once you've done it over a period of a couple of weeks, you could add more intense cardiovascular exercise, but not too intense, only to have your heart rate increase a little more than when walking, he says. According to Fredericson, some cases of COVID-19 cause severe inflammation throughout the body, and some of that inflammation can affect the heart muscle and cause myocarditis. It's been seen in people with severe and moderate cases of COVID-19, Fredericson adds.