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?

[DiscordandRhyme]

Same here. In early Feb I think I was awful. Dry then wet cough, chills, sore throat, body aches -- the bloody lot! I actually went to Doctor and they heard some crackling on lungs and got antibiotics.

But even now I still feel weak and tired all the time. I expect it's a coincidence but the similarities are uncanny and husband said so, then it was still essentially just in China/Singapore.

Even loss of taste/smell and headache was there. I expect it was a regular flu. Typical on a year I didn't get the flu jab.

[gokartdillydilly]

There is another virus called RSV, which is a severe Respiratory condition. Nasty. Could have been this. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virus

[gokartdillydilly]

Sorry, not sure what happened. Look here...
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_orthopneumovirus

[TimeAintNothing]

theguardian.com/society/2019/dec/02/nhs-winter-crisis-extra-beds-created-by-52-per-cent-of-uk-hospitals

www.warringtonguardian.co.uk/news/18088521.high-rates-flu-like-illness-schools-across-warrington/

www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/north-east-news/virus-60-north-east-schools-17292996

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/_chat/3745246-Anyone-else-got-that-horrible-virus-doing-the-rounds

Going off newspaper articles from the time and posts here on MN as well as my own experience of being ill alongside virtually everyone I know being ill with the same thing, they was definitely a nasty virus doing the rounds in November, December, and January.

The symptoms were pretty similar to CV19 so its plausible that it might have been CV19 but - so far - there is no evidence to say that it was. Maybe one day there'll be an answer. Who knows? There are always lots of bugs in winter so maybe this was just a bad year for them.

[TimeAintNothing]

FWIW, I had the bug that was going around in November. My brother, funnily enough recently returned from China, had it first and passed it to me, our mum, our dad, and I passed it to DH and the DC. I had fever, sweats, chills, extreme tiredness, my whole body ached, I had a burning sore throat where even breathing in air stung. I developed a horrible dry cough and tight feeling in my chest like I couldn't fully inhale so was short of breath. GP heard crackles so prescribed antibiotics which did absolutely nothing to resolve it. I was properly ill for around 10 days and the cough itself lingered on for several weeks. DH was the same. DC weren't so bad.

If there was evidence to suggest it had been circulating at that point then I'd think that yeah, I'd probably had it, but the earliest known cases so far have been traced to 17th November. It was 5th November when I got ill, I know the date because we were watching fireworks and I felt 'off' then a couple of hours later was in bed burning up with a headache that felt like my brain was bursting. Unless I was unknowingly Patient Zero, its highly unlikely I had CV19.

[Bloodless]

The last week in February I had an awful dry cough, with pains in my chest & a temperature. I’m asthmatic so went to Dr and he was said it was viral & not bacterial. He never mentioned corna. I have wondered myself if that could have been it, in which case it certainly wasn’t the worst chest infection I’ve had. I kinda hope it was so I don’t have to worry.

[booearing]

At the beginning of feb I was really ill
I’ve never felt so bad I just remember telling my family I felt so exhausted.
I had the high temperature the cough and other symptoms.
Even my family was asking are you sure that’s not corona but I was thinking it can’t be it’s not even around where we live.
It took me 4 weeks to get rid of my cough and I assumed it was flu.
Now I’m not so sure

[Chillicheese123]

Could have been circulating for a while but mutated recently which has caused the death spike?

[itsgettingweird]

Time I had the horrid throat illness in feb too. Horrid wasn't it? Nothing and I mean nothing touched it and my whole back of throat came up with what looked like the milk spots a baby gets on their face.
I had chest tightness and conscious breathing and crackles for 4 weeks afterwards.

[Oliversmumsarmy]

I think we all had it around Christmas/New Year

Dd who through one of her jobs speaks to 1000s of people each week caught it first. She was relatively ok. Then it went to Ds who didn’t get out of bed for days.

I caught it next and was worse than anyone.(Maybe because of my age)

Dp self isolated in a bedroom and he only came to the kitchen when we were no where around.
He can’t get ill as he has no immunity to viruses etc

Only a test will tell what we had.

I have had flu in the past and this definitely wasn’t like any flu I have had
The cough I thought would finish me off.

I don’t think there would have been a huge spike in deaths from this virus before it was known as the people who did die from this virus around December/January time were probably people with underlying health conditions and their deaths would have been attributed to their historic health conditions rather than a mystery virus.

[MarginalGain]

People are weirdly invested in the Imperial model. There is resistance to this emerging theory.

[MarginalGain]

MN has been telling people who question the reliability of the Imperial that they're thick for about a week now, maybe that's why.

[KittyJune]

I’ve heard this a lot and I’m not sure if it’s genuinely the case or if it might just be wishful thinking as having had it would mean you’re now immune. Which would be great! But remember that there are also a lot of other nasty winter bugs and viruses going around too. Yes you could have had Coronavirus as it could have been around since early December (in Wuhan) but I’m not quite sure how likely it is that people in the UK would have caught it this early. There’s simply no way to know at the moment. So you might have had it yes but it’s just as likely to have been something else.

[MaggieAndHopey]

All the people who reckon everyone had it at Christmas: can anyone explain why the hospitals weren't then desperately overrun with critically ill patients, as they are right now?

[Likethebattle]

I had that before Christmas and husband got it from me and I’ve been wondering if it was covid 19. Whatever it was it was nasty. No also got something in February with similar symptoms and a really high fever.

[PapercraftNinja]

Same here but wouldn’t want to trivialise the virus. Myself, DP, DD and DM all were so ill in succession since Christmas with symptoms worse than and different to the flu, very high temperature, chest pains, dry cough, headaches, fatigue. We spoke about this the other day. Luckily at that time we took it in turns to be off work and kept DD out of nursery for at least 7 days.

Completely agree that it must have been round for longer.

[PapercraftNinja]

@MaggieAndHopey because more people have been travelling in that time so it has increased the spread? I actually have no idea and don’t want to say I’ve had it in case I or any of my family do get it and it causes us to be hospitalised, which would be much worse than what we had.

[dontdisturbmenow]

What I find strange is that all the people who reckon they've had it all say they were really really ill, yet the vast majority of people who have actually had an official diagnosis have mild symptoms
That exactly!

The first people who were originally tested came back from an infected area and could trace it to people having had it abroad. It took only a week or so before it the first infection from the UK. If all those people had had it in December, there would have been many more cases when first tested that could not be traced to someone abroad or had been abroad.

I'm on the other side of the fence. I've just recovered from what was an odd virus. Only symptoms were a very painful throat and that burning crushing feeling on my lungs, pain in the back, mild breathlessness people describe when they've had it, that lasted 3 days or so but I had no fever and although the urge to cough all the time, no persistent cough. I felt well in myelf. So very mild case or something totally different?

[Zilla1]

This thread is a really interesting insight into the general public's psychology and how they have firm opinions about things beyond their understanding.

'I felt poorly in December or January so must have had it' or 'it must have been around for longer' even though COVID doesn't seem to present with any individual symptoms that are unique, rather most of the symptoms also present in the rhinovirus, human corona virus and 'flu that spike every winter, there was little of the mortality associated with COVID in December, January and February and (the pathetically little) testing in early months do not show significant COVID positive patients in acute.

[Sugarplumfairy65]

Anyone run out if tinfoil yet?

[RedToothBrush]

The Imperial model isn't the only model out there. The Oxford University one is interesting.

Both theories have merit in their own ways. We do not know which is correct.

The most worrying aspect about the imperial one is that when social distancing measures are relaxed everyone is going to go nuts and have big parties or go on big drinking sessions... which are an ideal source of sparking off a second wave and clogging up A&E with dickheads at the same time.

[Oliversmumsarmy]

gokartdillydilly

What I had was definitely not RSV.

A. I am not a child
B. It wasn’t mild
C. I don’t have underlying health conditions
D. There is no mention of the cough

Given atm the first signs of Corona in Wuhan was mid November (if that is where it did start) I don’t think it is too far a stretch that people could be seeing signs of it here in December at least.

Atm the first signs of Corona in the uk is down as mid January.
A week ago they were saying that the first people to catch it in the uk was later.

At the start of this the inference was it didn’t start at all till very end of December not mid November

Who is to say that it will change to much earlier

[Affirmative106]

I believe my mother had it during Christmas. She had been traveling. Her symptoms were spot on, lasted 3 weeks and had her looking like she was on deaths door. She went into kidney failure and almost died. The diagnosis the doctors gave her was that she was dehydrated (which was ridiculous because she was drinking quite a lot). They never gave her an actual reason and eventually her kidney function came back. Now she has problems tasting food, which seems to be a lasting symptom in some people.
What's strange is that no one else in the family got it, or if we did, were asympyomatic. That's why I'm skeptical that this is really that contagious. If it's been going around, why are we not all dead by now, why were the hospitals not overwhelmed a while ago?
The more I think about it, the more I think this is all a bunch of bullshit. The reasons why scare me more than the virus.

[Samcarpy92]

No, you didn’t.

[Oliversmumsarmy]

Zilla1 what I had might have some nod towards being fly but it was the cough that was so different from normal flu.

I am late 50s so am not a youngster and the cough was something I have never experienced before.

This was definitely not normal flu.
I have had flu (even one of the nasty varieties) and it was for me very different in someways to “normal” flu.