To think I’ve had COVID 19, and it’s been here a while?

[VivienScott]

After Xmas I came down with what I thought was a terrible cold. Dry persistent cough, terrible fever, worse than I’ve ever had to the point I was delirious, difficulty breathing, though not pneumonia. Saw out of hours and they check oxygen levels, chest etc, said I was ok to be home, but I was not first case they’d seen like this and there was “something really awful going round this year”. Consequently had to see GP who said he’d had to hospitalise a lot more people than normal for breathing difficulties.
It all sounds exactly like coronavirus, it really felt like something dreadful to the extent I deliberately kept myself from others more than I would with a cold. I honestly believe it was, but it’s way before it was supposed to be in Europe let alone here in UK. What do you think, AIBU to think it’s been here longer than we’re aware?

With small children, every winter from Sept to March someone is coughing or sneezing. Some winters are worse than others, but there are huge amounts of viruses that do the rounds. Impossible to tell what version of anything you have.

After Christmas day and for the first two weeks of January I came down with an awful illness. Started with a fever...I was shivering and sweating in bed and every part of me ached. I was exhausted and could not get up. No cold symptoms but the most awful cough I've ever had...the cough lingered for ages. I keep telling my dh that I swear I had corona but he keeps saying it couldn't have been and thinks I'm mad for suggesting it.

Yeah I think the Ken Morley thing is a red herring sorry

Couple of genuine questions though for the scientists:

1. How can we be so definite that the first persons to bring the virus to the UK were the couple who fell ill in the hotel in York when we are told many people are asymptomatic or not ill enough for medical attention? Is it not plausible that it could have arrived in the Uk slightly earlier than this and started spreading down different routes? Even a week or two would make a big difference to slowing down the spread wouldn't it?

2. How do we know what the infection/death rates are when testing isn't widespread? I read somewhere any hospital admission is tested whether they came in with Covid symptoms or for something else (or is this bollocks?)

Genuinely curious to get a logical view of these points please. No sneering that these are stupid questions please.

WaxOnFeckOff .

But I heard that the actor who played Janine in Eastenders went into a Chinese takeaway and 2 days later had a runny nose in 2017!

Not stupid questions at all @HereDefenders. I'm not a scientist, but for question 1 i'd say it is possible but really couldn't be that much earlier as those with no symptoms would still have spread it to someone who would have ended up needing medical attention. By that point the medics were on alert for people showing symptoms so I think you would be talking a matter of days difference imo.

For question 2, they can only really give the death rate based on confirmed cases. I'm guessing they are using the results of current testing to give a broad view of the relative infection rate within the general populace using statistical modelling that is beyond my skills :)

For example, I worked a few desks from someone who can back from Northern Italy but not exactly the regions in lockdown/alert, right when it was kicking off. He would no doubt be travelling with people from those areas on the plane. He didn't isolate. nearly two weeks later, I had the symptoms at the weekend and contacted my manager, I then found out that another person who sat nearby had been admitted to hospital the previous week with pneumonia and was a confirmed case. Based on that I am assuming that I've had it and DH caught it from me. Neither of us will appear on any stats as we weren't tested or unwell enough to seek medical advice.

Unless we get an immunity test we will never be 100% sure. DS 19 lives with us and I'm also sure he must have caught it but has shown no symptoms, but who knows.

I've had worse flu infections and chest infections, probably about the same time as Ken Morley... :o

Your first question is answered in here www.cambridgeindependent.co.uk/news/cambridge-virologist-explains-what-we-know-and-dont-know-about-covid-19-9104220/

The second, they can't know for sure and that's why the WHO wants to increase testing. However, experts in the field the world over are working on this almost exclusively and have estimated infection and death rates based on their expertise and the data available so far.

If it were likely that vast swathes of the population had already had it and the death rate was actually much lower as a result then I don't think most countries would be trashing their economies to protect their health systems on the basis of expected further infections and deaths. These aren't steps taken lightly or without due consideration by those best placed to do so.

Oh and there was another person nearby me who also had symptoms and italy guy never did. His girlfriend who he traveled to Italy with and lived with got ill with fever and cough the same weekend as me. Not been back in the office since, so no idea how that all panned out. None of these other people are in my team.

And I agree, they're obviously not stupid questions but unfortunately they don't have simple answers. That leads to a lot of "unknown unknowns" (I.e. most people don't know the scale of their ignorance on the topic, including me, and I would welcome comment from those better informed). When that is the case conspiracy tends to abound as an overly simple, but seemingly logical, answer to a very complex question.

Thanks awkward, I read that Cambridge article (3x now!) but it doesn't really answer the question - she refers to a virus producing a productive cough which is different to what a lot of people have experienced this winter and also she talks about whether the virus could have originated in the UK or outside China - I don't think anyone is questioning the origin.

We had 2 known cases in the UK on 31 Jan but and 35 known cases by 1 March. None of those would be statistically significant surely. I can't really explain it well but what I am trying to say is even when we went looking for it, it doesn't sound like a huge amount of people were seeking medical attention at the outset or maybe people were suffering from these common types of symptoms and not getting tested because the expectation was that it was so rare at that time it was unlikely to be Covid?

It was known about globally when I went to the GP about my 'flu' and he didn't test me for anything. I'm just a bit surprised that when they knew about an outbreak globally then in the UK they didn't start swabbing people to check it hadn't arrived on our shores?

I hope some of this gets explained one day because at the moment there is so much that doesn't make any sense to me!

She gives a productive cough as one example actually.

“We have had other infections over the winter that people may be confusing with it and the most persistent was a productive cough that people couldn’t shake, but that’s not the same thing.”

Yes, exactly. It's an example of the other infections.

You weren't tested because we were in the phase of contact tracing and quarantine of those arriving from places with significant outbreaks.

Yes I understand that that was the protocol at the time but as we knew there was a global threat emerging and the UK had already developed a test (we were one of the first countries to do so), then why not test people who presented with covid like symptoms at the time? I feel like valuable time was wasted in the early days. Clearly the strategy they adopted didn’t work because now they are saying up to 1m people could be infected which suggests our strategy wasn’t effective.

Is there any reason to be rude? A question was asked and I answered. China has already been proven to have lied, experts have said they have underplayed numbers of deaths so who is to say they didn't underplay anything else related? It's already been shown to have many different strains and so could have been mutating for months prior.
This is why the antibody test is so vital. Not just so we can hopefully return to normal quicker but to shut up morons who cannot help but be rude to others for trying to track where and when it was possibly around before it was widely known about.

Ken from Coronation St, really? It's laughable. Sorry if you find that rude. You must see how ridiculous it looks? But I'm the moron - ok then.

Does anyone know why we didn't go into lockdown a couple of years ago when 250,000 died of flu?
It wasn't even mentioned, and worrying that as this is more contagious surely we are looking at a million dying.
Strangely enough one of the downing st statements said a million but was soon changed.
Very interesting how people are rolling over, doing as told and not questioning this new world order. I thought more would have rebelled.

www.kentlive.news/news/kent-news/kent-coronavirus-8-signs-you-3994653

8 signs you had coronavirus before the outbreak.

From an FT article about the same study:

"However, the modelling by Oxford’s Evolutionary Ecology of Infectious Disease group has been challenged by other scientists. They have pointed out that the study presents possible scenarios — based on assumptions about the nature of the virus, its virulence and its arrival from China — that contradict those supported by most epidemiologists."

Even then they're talking about invisible spread in Jan / Feb, not December.

"However, the modelling by Oxford’s Evolutionary Ecology of Infectious Disease group has been challenged by other scientists. They have pointed out that the study presents possible scenarios — based on assumptions about the nature of the virus, its virulence and its arrival from China — that contradict those supported by most epidemiologists."

Great that people are challenging the Oxford model. Bravo. Long may it live.

Wouldn't it be so sensible if people were questioning the Imperial one too?

Wouldn't it be so sensible if people were questioning the Imperial one too?

I agree with this.

I don't believe either of them are wholly correct. The real answer is probably somewhere in the middle, but we may never know...

If the real answer is in the middle it points to infection spreading late Feb...

“Somewhere” in the middle. Not “the middle”

How do you work that out anyway? The first community transmission was confirmed late Feb anyway. That’s not disputed. It’s the unconfirmed cases we are querying. I find it highly unlikely that the first confirmed community transmission cases were the actual first ones - there must have been more that went undetected.

www.ft.com/content/ebab9fcc-6e8d-11ea-9bca-bf503995cd6f

That's interesting too.

If the most extreme part of the Oxford model is right then we are already close to herd immunity and the death rate is much smaller than previously thought - which would be absolutely fantastic and would hopefully end lockdown immediately - but even then pre New Year infections were not covid19.

I suspect the scientific consensus is pretty strong that herd immunity is a long way off though hence lockdown. We'll have to see about that. Sweden's results will be interesting to watch.

Because the model is for silent spread in February as I understand it but happy to be corrected? So numbers increase later in Feb