Already had it?!

[MaomiMak]

I had a routine GP appt this morning.

There were a massive spike in horrible coughs and shortness of breath at the beginning of the year. Coughs that went on for weeks and they said we are seeing a lot of this and it going on for ages.

I needed asthma inhalers again.

With hindsight she said I've probably had coronavirus already. There isn't always a temperature with it and I didn't have one.

It was fine if I did have it. I'm fully recovered though it took weeks.

I suppose I'm sceptical as I've had these types of coughs most winters for several years; I'm especially prone to viral coughs and my asthma goes nuts.

Every winter people get very bad colds, respiratory illnesses and the flu but of course this year everyone is convinced they had Covid-19

Yesterday they estimated that upto 10,000 in the UK could have already had it. It is therefore really quite possible that some of these previous flu like illnesses could have been Covid19.

It would really help with the herd immunity if that was the case.

This winter I've actually been very well so I'm pretty sure I haven't had it.

I think I might have had it. I had an awful cough for weeks on end, 4 at least. It was keeping me up at night and the only thing that helped was honey. My children now have varying degrees of cough. One of them had a slight fever but only for about an hour. All other temps have seemed ok.

And this was early February

Both DH and I had a really bad cough that lasted about 10 days in January. I reckon that was covid!

@Ihatemyseleffordoingthis I don't think I am retrofitting it. The symptoms I had in late December were exact. Like nothing I've ever experienced. So bad at one point in the night, DP wanted to take me to hospital as my lungs felt like concrete.
We know now that the earliest definite case in China was 17th November. That was one bad enough they sought advice. If that's the case it could've easily been around before that due to incubation/milder symptoms.
Of course, I'm not going to go knock on my neighbours door and say oi your lot gave me the virus.
However with what the consultant (lung specialist) said and with what was said yesterday about possibly many thousands having it or having had it and being clueless, it's probable down to who I was exposed to and the symptoms, plus the timing.

@lindy I thought the figure of 10000 who might be currently infected with the virus, not that 10000 had had it in the past?

I am sure I had corona virus 3 or 4 times in the last 5 years. All the symptoms match.

Unless you have test results, you will never know. But if it makes you feel better to think you have, why not

I’m sure we’ve all had strains of Coronavirus, it’s a common virus. I guess we need to clarify that we mean the Covid-19 strain.

but what was yesterday described as hay fever will be renamed covid19 tomorrow.

Ihatemyseleffordoingthis you could well be right. I just remember hearing that figure and being surprised. I guess it could be a combination of past cases and current, especially as some people seem well again in just a week or two.

I had a cold/cough with similar symptoms to corona. If so, I'm glad it's done.

I wouldn't be surprised if I've had it due to my constant (although stopped at the moment) business travel.

Since October I've been to Shanghai x 2, Singapore x 2, Malaysia x 1, Abu Dhabi x 2, Italy (Rome, though) x 1, Spain x 1, Netherlands x 1, Czech Rep x 1, Dubai x 1.

That I can remember...

And when I was last in Abu Dhabi (Jan), which was immediately after China, I had a terrible cough and generally felt awful. I know exactly when this was as I've just found receipts from the little Boots store in Abu Dhabi airport where I'd bought vitamin C, strepsils, cough sweets, etc, etc, at vastly inflated prices.

Who knows though...and I'm taking no chances as we help our elderly parents quite a bit so really don't want to risk catching it if not already had it.

My daughter and i were only discussing this yesterday,as she had a very bad cough and exactly what everyone here gas been saying
She had it for about 6 weeks and all through Christmas,
She had 3 lots of antibiotics, before it went,and was tested for pneumonia
We do know now that this coronavirus started long before all this panic, so i think it is very likely all the people talking about that outbreak around Christmas have had it already

We are the same. 6 weeks ago ds had a huge spike in temperature that we couldn't bring down for days - he also had a sore throat headache and tiredness. He was having two hour naps all throughout the day. It took two weeks before he was anywhere near normal again. He went to the gp 3 times in this time as we were so worried about him.
A week into his illness I caught it off him, I have really never felt this I'll with a cold or flu before. I had to come home from work and slept myself for days. I too went to the doctor.
Our baby then got it but didn't seem as I'll as the rest of us.
5 weeks later I still have the cough

I’m not quite sure if people will be immune to this after recovery, based on this article:

Most patients seem to make full recoveries, but people who've recovered could still get the virus again in the future.

So the theory is lots and lots of people had Corona virus over Christmas but with no spike in the rate of hospital admissions or deaths beyond what we'd expect at that time of year.

Well arent we clever.

I have been banging on about the fact that our extended family all had dreadful and quite idiosyncratic repetitive coughing and unwellness over the festive season. An elderly parent was pretty poorly as a result and was prescribed weapons grade antibiotics. It was very specific and different to the usual colds and flu symptoms. I wondered at the time if it was something novel. Guess we might find out in due course.

Me and my son had pneumonia in January. Still coughing now. Not sure if it’s just because it’s winter. We’re isolated anyway as we live in the middle of nowhere (not the UK). Had an xray to check our lungs, waiting for results.

I think my daughter's school music teacher has had it. She hasn't been tested, but she was in bed for a month and said she has never ben so ill in her life. She has only just started teaching again.

I wold like to know what sort of cough it is. Aside from being exceptional anxious about my parents (and unlike many people on Mumsnet I do not ordinarily suffer from anxiety) I am also worried about the fact that, as someone with rhinitis and hay fever, people will think I have Covid-19 when I don't. I have had a mild cough since October and am beginning to get seasonal hay fever that affects my breathing and gives me a post-nasal drip that caused coughing.

I'm convinced my family has had it too. My bro works in China on and off and my 90yr old Mum spent time with them (in Italy, believe it or not!) in November, then came down with the most horrendous cough and pneumonia. Roll on Christmas and I also had it. Not pneumonia but the worst cough since I had whooping cough, and a bad 5-day fever. We both had the flu jab previous to falling ill.

So if so many people had it over Christmas why did what happened in Wuhan, or what is happening in Italy or Iran, not happen here? Where are the mass graves? Where are the dead? Why are numbers of new infections rising rapidly now, when we should have peaked - after all it's not like we were doing anything to stop spread over that period?

I’m convinced one of the medical secretaries here has had it. She’s been off for two weeks and reported a high fever, hacking dry cough and extremely painful “lung pain”. She’s back now and still sounds awful. This woman has never been off sick.

She’s the secretary for all the obs and gynae team and her office is in the antenatal clinic, so that’s fun.

I really wish this was true, but to be honest, there is international travel all the time and there are many really nasty viruses with coughs that I've seen circulating in London over the last ten years. Seven years ago we had a terrible spate of these coughs that were leaving people gasping for breath, and local GPs were telling us not to worry if we had coughs and shortness of breath for over 3 weeks as this was just the nature of the viruses they were witnessing at the time. I have had two very nasty flu-like colds in the past couple of months, but I really don't think it was Covid19, as none of my relatives over 70 (who I have very regular contact with) have been ill with them. I don't think we should be too complacent - the best advice I've seen is act like you've got the virus (fastidiously protecting others from infection) rather than acting like you don't want to get the virus.

I was ill from mid December, all through Christmas and I'm still not 100% better today. Dry, dry cough that was relentless. I really struggled to breath and coughed so much that I ended up in hospital with internal bleeding from a burst blood vessel in my abdomen. Chest x-ray was clear and I was told it was viral so no anti-biotics given. I'm not asthmatic but they gave me an inhaler to help me breath though the coughing fits which were agony. To be fair they were more worried about stopping the bleeding.

My DH had it, but he wasn't as bad as me and one of my DCs was quite poorly and had to take time off work.

For sure it was a coronavirus - but I think it was probably too early to be Covid-19. It would good to know if it was actually Covid-19 because then I would be able to stop worrying - my abs couldn't take another cough like that. Though if such a test exists, I can't see priority being given to testing people that have already had it.