Is Reiki the Answer to Long Covid?

With an increasing number of people around the world presenting with long Covid, we’re staring down the barrel of a long-term health crisis that is going to require an increase in healthcare resources. This begs the question: are we considering all options including new-age treatments such as reiki? The benefits can't be explained scientifically, yet, but here’s why alternative treatments should be considered.

It is only this year that I’ve had access to people who have caught Covid-19 since in New Zealand we went with an elimination strategy when it came to the virus. Previous to this it was rare to know someone who had caught Covid-19 and I hadn’t known or come across anyone personally who had had it. Because of this, I had never had the opportunity to give Reiki healing to anyone who was suffering from long Covid, so I had never had the opportunity to realise what Reiki could do to help these people.

To quickly give some background information on Reiki: Reiki is a Japanese-born energy healing technique that works on infusing the body with healing Reiki light energy. It works on a person’s whole being including the spiritual, mental, emotional and physical bodies. As an energy healing technique, it has a sweet, gentle nature to it and is extremely safe to perform on anyone. When giving Reiki healing the practitioner benefits just as much as the patient.

During my years as a Reiki practitioner, I’ve had the privilege of helping people with a variety of ailments; ailments that have affected all levels of their being. With this type of experience and exposure to Reiki, the Reiki practitioner starts to see patterns in how it feels to treat certain ailments and emotional traumas. Of the handful of long Covid patients that I’ve seen and performed Reiki on the Reiki energy has acted very differently from how it usually does, which makes me question whether there is a place for Reiki in the treatment of long Covid.

The first long Covid patient I saw was a teenage girl who had been experiencing ongoing Covid symptoms for two months after her first Covid-positive result. She was no longer infectious but was still experiencing extreme fatigue, head fog and a temperature that was still mildly up and down. In the one hour session, she fell asleep within five minutes and remained solidly asleep for the duration. This in itself was unusual since it was off the back of her waking up from a long sleep just over an hour beforehand, because of her age and because she hadn’t done anything strenuous over the last week. Her temperature regulated throughout the session too and she woke up feeling refreshed and 'bubbly' (this is unusual too as most people describe feeling calm and peaceful afterwards).

What I experienced during the session was also unusual. I can always feel and see Reiki energy transferring from my hands to the person in front of me but there is usually a gentle, easy, calm flow to this energy transfer. In this instance, the Reiki energy was powering out of my hands quickly and intensely, similar to how the water in a big waterfall rushes down. It was also rushing to the upper body and head even as I was trying to direct it to this girl's feet. It wasn’t draining on me at all as Reiki never should be but it was as though this girl’s body and the Reiki energy were in desperate need of each other.

A one-off instance such as this wouldn't cause me to question the experience. Since seeing this teenage girl though every long Covid patient that has come to see me for Reiki healing has produced the same experience for both me and them. The rushing of energy from my hands, the instant and deep sleep that they go into and the ‘refreshed’ feeling after the sessions are all the same.  
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So, maybe the medical field should be exploring some alternative therapies to help treat long Covid since there are only limited treatments at the moment. Alongside a person’s usual medical treatment and care, we could see a long-term solution to treating and eliminating long Covid for good. It's worth a try, right?