People with coughs shouldn’t be allowed in restaurants?

[Andrewsgirl]

AIBU to think people with continual coughs shouldn’t be allowed in a restaurant at the moment and to be annoyed a restaurant allowed someone with a very obvious cough dine there?

A continual cough is a Covid symptom. I was shocked to sit at a table next to a diner who spent most of the night continually coughing

My husband has been continually coughing since 1991 but you are right no one would know that. Do you think he would be refused entry because of his cough, or asked to leave if he was already inside? I thought a year of shielding was hard to do, but it seems going out again will be even more problematic for us because he can't not cough.

So many disability & health reasons why someone may have a continuous cough and breathing problems. Predating Covid lockdown periods even...,

As a CEV person with severe chronic asthma and damaged lungs, who is in and out of A&e and tests regularly with LFT anyway, you think if I cough I must have COVID?

It's mortifying anyway to cough a lot, when you are disabled, without intolerant people diagnosing you with COVID from afar... I must have had Covid for 3 years... because Meh who cares that cancer patients, those with COPD, severe allergies, lung disorders or the 5% asthmatics who have have severe asthma that is life threatening and chronic, even though we are the ones that will wear a mask anyway, well by all means add to our fabulous experience . It'snot at all isolating 🥺🙄

I have asthma and hay fever. I cough all year round. Should I never be allowed out then?

Don't be so silly

@whereislittleroo

I have asthma and hay fever. I cough all year round. Should I never be allowed out then?

Well that depends... does your cough sound new, or old?

Totally unreasonable. My lo has croup at the mo and I am sick to death of people staring at her / us when out and about people think covid is the only thing going on in the world, there are much much worse things happening

@Andrewsgirl

I’m not trying to wind anyone up. I am interested in what other peoples thoughts are. When I made the booking the email confirmation clearly says you should not attend if you have Covid symptoms. A continual cough is a Covid symptom. I was shocked to sit at a table next to a diner who spent most of the night continually coughing.

No. A new continuous cough is a Covid symptom. If somebody has an ongoing cough that is explained by other medical conditions then it is not an indicator of Covid.

@Thedogscollar

Maybe stupid people should be banned from resturaunts too. Looking at you OP.

@JeansShirtJeansJacket mine is old. But the OP didn't specify.

@Andrewsgirl

I’m not trying to wind anyone up. I am interested in what other peoples thoughts are. When I made the booking the email confirmation clearly says you should not attend if you have Covid symptoms. A continual cough is a Covid symptom. I was shocked to sit at a table next to a diner who spent most of the night continually coughing.

You clearly weren't shocked enough to make your excuses and leave though, if they were doing it "most of the night"?

No I don't think that businesses should be ejecting people for displaying a symptom of covid, that could just as easily be a symptom of something else. How humiliating for the diner to be removed, or forced to share medical details to defend themselves. The restaurant will ask people not to attend if you have covid symptoms and quite rightly trust customers to do just that. If you are worried, remove yourself.

@Andrewsgirl

Bit of a difficult thing to establish though, whether it’s new or old cough !

So you should mind your own business

Bit of a difficult thing to establish though, whether it’s new or old cough

No, it’s not. The person would obviously know if it’s a new or old cough! The guidance is Covid symptoms. A continuous cough is only a Covid symptom if it’s a new continuous cough, not chronic and the person would well know which of these applies to them.

YABU.

I’ve walked out of a restaurant, though it was months ago now.

I don’t think it’s possible to ban anyone with symptoms as there are so many causes of those symptoms. You have to accept that if you go out, you’re increasing your risk. Not everyone is responsible.

That said, a cough isn’t even one of the top symptoms of delta, so unless you can spot the person who had a headache, but has taken paracetamol and gone ahead with their booking, you aren’t assessing your risk properly anyway.

I completely understand how you feel though.

I went to a Mexican restaurant for a meal when the first lockdown lifted. I inadvertently managed to get a particularly hot chilli stuck in my throat. I then spent the next hour and a half coughing, continuously. A new continuous cough. Due to a sodding chilli. Anyone who arrived after I had the audacity to swallow a chilli in a Mexican restaurant might have thought I should be wearing my ‘diseased’ bell. Presumably I should have paid up and left my half eaten meal just to reassure them?

That's me banned from eating out then. Forever 🙄 😄
Seriously, people cough for lots of reasons. Mine is asthma.

This is like the first days of the pandemic when people were calling others who bought bread murderers and where people were paranoid about the tiniest thing.

If the OP is so worried about coughing people in restaurants then maybe she shouldn’t be going to restaurants.

It doesn’t take much to rouse the amateur witch hunters, does it? Scary.

Not every cough is Covid, and if you’re double jabbed you should be ok regardless, otherwise what is the point of the vaccine? I get a cough every year from may-September due to hayfever should I not be leaving my house?

Then don’t go to restaurants. Stay in your bunker at home and live off the 2000 bags of pasta you probably bought in March 2020.

I bet nights out are fun with you, OP.

dont be stupid , i cough a lot and iv got a friend who has copd who coughs , i think people with this level of paranoia need to be eating indoors never mind resturants