Have cold symptoms resulted in a positive Covid Test?

[user1490814754]

Sorry if this has been asked before. Any parents that have had children go on to have a positive result ... what symptoms did there child have?

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I had a runny nose. My employer is testing anyone, even just those with cold symptoms. My test was positive. I didn’t develop any further symptoms.

Thank you! There is so much mis information about runny nose etc NOT being a symptom. I'm not convinced. Surely aninfecrion that affects throat, eyes and taste buds could cause a runny nose and cold symptoms but I understand why they dont want tests being used up for the common cold.

An infection even

There are also a lot of false positives though. There was a great thread on it recently explaining why widespread asymptomatic testing was a bad idea. Even on a 95% accurate test, 1 person in every 20 will have to isolate because they've had a false positive.

My employer is testing for the following symptoms

Temperature
Fever
Loss of smell/taste
Runny nose
Sore throat
Horse voice
Fatigue
Headache lasting more than a day.

This is based on the advice of our company doctor.

It’s a bit ott tbh but I appreciate that they’re taking it seriously and that I easy access to a test.

Runny nose, sneezing, hoarse voice, followed by an occasional barky cough that became chesty.

@BlusteryShowers

There are also a lot of false positives though. There was a great thread on it recently explaining why widespread asymptomatic testing was a bad idea. Even on a 95% accurate test, 1 person in every 20 will have to isolate because they've had a false positive.

Yes that’s a good point. I’m having an antibody test through work soon so I should know for definite soon.

@BlusteryShowers

There are also a lot of false positives though. There was a great thread on it recently explaining why widespread asymptomatic testing was a bad idea. Even on a 95% accurate test, 1 person in every 20 will have to isolate because they've had a false positive.

However aren’t “false positives” caused when a very small amount of dead virus is detected (eg from a previous Covid infection) so the sample will be positive, but not a live/infectious virus?

And I’m sure I’ve read false positives are around 1%, while false negatives are about 30%.

@BlusteryShowers Can you link to any evidence that there are a lot of false positives? I have noticed a lot of people misunderstanding a government document which rightly talks about the importance of eliminating false positives, but doesn't make any attempt to estimate an actual false positive rate.

Posted on another similar thread. My teen got positive test, symptoms were 1. Headache then later 2. fever.

This is the thread I was talking about

Aibu to explain why testing lots of asymptomatic people everyday is a bad idea http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/amiibeingunreasonable/4019922-to-explain-why-testing-lots-of-asymptomatic-people-everyday-is-a-bad-idea

One of the parents in my sons class recently tested positive and described it as a cold.

Yep- no symptoms except a cold and headache and tested positive. Dd who had a runny nose and bit of a cough (hence testing) was negative. Hers must have been a false negative as far as I can see as it was near impossible to get a decent swab.

Yep colleague sent home with a cold - positive. Colleague's child sent home with a cold - positive.

However also people sent home with colds, coughs, change of taste all negative.

My daughter had ear pain and high temp. Postive test.

Yes, my sisters children all had classic common cold symptoms, sister had headache and temperature. Nobody had a cough. All definitely had it, because subsequently had positive antibody test results, too.

This gov.uk link shows the research and suggests that under laboratory conditions the rate of both false positive and false negative should be 5% or less - however reviewing actual tests done in the community suggests a false positive rate of around 2.7% and a false negative rate of 20% or more, because of issues with the way samples are taken etc.

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