Having had shingles, I don’t believe it is all that serious. She must have something else, in addition to shingles.
Many years ago I lost a much beloved Aunt to shingles. She was in her 50's, and it destroyed her.
Granted, treatments have come a long way since then. But DiFi is 89. It's entirely possible she'll die from shingles, regardless of any other maladies.
She was barely coherent during the Kavanagh confirmation
A lot of people her age with shingles, get a kind of meningitis from the virus.
Depends...Shingles can have bad neurological effects, especially on the elderly. Feinstein appears to have had issues with memory loss prior to the shingles. Shingles can cause domino effects with other body systems in those with advanced ages 80 years or over. Even in younger people, shingles can affect a person up to 6 weeks with severe symptoms though most will recover. Some folks though have residual symptoms such as numbness tingling, sensory loss that can last the rest of their lives. Some develop repeated “flare up” symptoms though the repeats are mostly short lived and not as severe as the first bout. It’s when shingles gets into the brain that the disease is its most serious and often deadly. Even if such brain affected patients survive it, they are never really fully functional at best after the disease subsides. At worst,they have dementia,are bed ridden,with eventual death occuring in a skilled nurse facility or in hospice.
I had shingles this time last year. I am still recovering emotionally from what I went through with the pain.
Shingles pain is the pain of childbirth without the respite between contractions. 4 children, yes.
Gabapentin turned my mind to mush. The highest dose of Lyrica finally gave me some relief, after we spent a small fortune on prescription strength lidocaine patches, that I had to beg for.
You had a mild case.