To think I shouldn't have a cold?

[EasternDailyStress]

I've been so careful. Go out once a week to shop, wear a mask, constantly sanitise and wash hands. Work from home. Socially distance if I see my parents/grown up children. And yet I've still managed to pick up a cold. DH and DS don't have one, so where has it come from??

It's made me realise how easy it is to pick up Covid despite almost self-isolating.

I’ve heard others say this too and I wonder how on earth it could happen, and it just shows you how easy it is to pick up bugs including covid. Scary indeed, but if we start living like something is going to kill us every time we step out the door then we’ll never live at all.
Hope you feel better soon!

@WilsonMilson thanks. It's such a mystery though. Binge-watched The Fall from my sickbed, so not all bad 😁 Great username!

It’s something to do with the size of the droplets affecting transmission, I think. I vaguely remember reading something about it recently.

Why would it be a cold? I remember reading mid lockdown in some scientific news journal that (at the time I was reading the article) in New Zealand and Australia colds and flu had been eradicated. All due to covid restrictions apparently. I have no idea what the rates of infection there would be now.

I also read a few weeks ago (NHS England data) that colds were running at 5 per 100,000 population.

So it wouldn't make sense to assume that you have the thing that you're statistically more unlikely to have.

Hayfever or an allergic reaction of some sort OP? It took me years to realise I had this

Because masks don't protect you from viruses, I'm not sure why people think they do. They only protect others from large droplets should you cough/shout /sneeze. Airborne viral particles are tiny and are not filtered out by masks.

Because most cold viruses are rhinoviruses, not coronaviruses, so they spread in a different way to covid. That's the only explanation I can come up with!

@Mumsn0t

Why would it be a cold? I remember reading mid lockdown in some scientific news journal that (at the time I was reading the article) in New Zealand and Australia colds and flu had been eradicated. All due to covid restrictions apparently. I have no idea what the rates of infection there would be now.

I also read a few weeks ago (NHS England data) that colds were running at 5 per 100,000 population.

So it wouldn't make sense to assume that you have the thing that you're statistically more unlikely to have.

How do they know, unless people are testing for colds?

Practically the whole of DD2’s class were ill a couple of weeks ago, snotty, sneezing and coughing. I know of at least 7 who were tested for Covid (including DD2) and all were negative so I assume that was a cold virus.

Also, who ‘reports’ a cold to someone? I can’t see how they can possibly know how many colds are circulating.

I think colds are a lot more contagious than Covid from what I’ve been reading - they produce more symptoms that spread it. Covid is dry a cold is wet so you have breathing but also, sneezing, snot/runny nose and coughing.

I've no idea on how NHS England or anyone else gathers empirical evidence but anyone reading the date, it would be right to question it, we should question everything we are told!

And there is so much to question with covid. Apparently approximately 30% of tests record a false negative possibly due to a low loading dose of the virus, possibly due to the test itself.

The symptoms aren't always the ones we're told to look out for-our main symptoms were that of a cold with a sore throat and stuffy then runny nose being the main problem. My ds mostly suffered with headache, back ache and nausea.

So who knows if it's a cold or not!