It's time we/they acknowledged more symptoms

[Catyness]

I've been really frustrated by this for ages. The WHO lists a whole range of symptoms for covid. Everyone I know who has had it didn't start their illness with fever, cough, loss of taste and smell, they started with headaches, body aches, runny nose, sore throat, fatigue or upset stomachs and then went on to develop characteristic symptoms.

Ignoring these other symptoms means people are not isolating and so spreading the virus in the first days of their illness. And that's not even touching on how children may well not even develop any of the 3 acknowledged symptoms at any point.

Now there are more tests available, surely it's time to start testing when people become unwell with a wider range of symptoms. I'd think this would be more effective than blanket testing populations to pick up the few asymptomatic.

It's tricky as if they add headache to the list of symptoms you'd have so many people isolating and overwhelming the test system. Headache is a common symptom of COVID, but people also get headaches for lots of other reasons.

I had a headache on Day 1, which is unusual for me. I could have gone out and about that day but I didn't, it wasn't until 24 hours later I lost my sense of smell. I could have spread it about in that 24 hours.

The thing is, those symptoms are really common for loads of things and people are less likely to comply if they have to isolate too often. And what about people with IBS? They'd never be able to go out if they had to isolated with every upset stomach.

If you have ibs or regular headaches you would have every reason to ignore them. If they’re symptoms unusual to you I think we should at lead time be allowed to test and everyone needs to have an awareness that it could be covid. I rarely get headaches so it would be a clear warning to me that I could have caught covid, but so many people aren’t aware of this and trust the government symptom list.

The issue with that is that there is a caveat saying that some people can ignore the symptoms then it adds complexity which will inevitably reduce compliance . And employers are likely to use this loophole to insist that people come to work.

In an ideal world everyone would be able to easily isolate at the merest symptom with no penalty from their employer or no effect on their mental health but we don't live in an ideal world sadly.

It's beyond ridiculous to say every person with a headache, upset stomach, runny nose or sore throat should isolate/be tested. In winter that could amount to millions and millions of people getting tests/staying at home for normal everyday illnesses.

The obvious problem is that covid is extremely hard to identify. And yet, there is still a belief that it can be identified and that testing and isolating are effective measures. Testing and isolating works for id llnesses like measles, ebola and SARS because they have very very distinct symptoms that most infected people get quickly. For covid, testing and isolating at best has a minimal effect - a proportion of people get tested when they should and some isolate effectively. Many many others just don't know they're infected. That's largely because, thankfully, most people infected with covid don't feel very ill.

I was thinking the same this morning. I've had a headache every day (perhaps one day without? But can't quite remember) for over a week now. I don't usually suffer with headaches so I'm starting to worry that it's covid related 🤷🏻‍♀️

I've had a headache for days I've also run out of eyedrops and I'm spending far too long on my phone

Logically I dont have it in the back of my mind my brain is ticking what if what if what if

I hate this

They'd need to create more local test centres then as well, because our nearest one is 40 minutes away and it's not realistic to take my children on an hour and half round trip every time one of them gets a cold. They're in preschool, they have colds most of the winter!

Agree with the idea in theory though, and would definitely be on board if testing was easier and quicker!

The government are saying you should only be tested if you have one of the 3 main symptoms, but then they're also choosing a bunch of areas in which to test absolutely everyone. They'd be better off letting anyone who feels they need a test, have one. With covid having such a wide range of symptoms, I reckon there are more "non-classic" cases getting missed than asymptomatic ones.

3 members of our household recently had a strange illness that lasted about a week each. Symptoms were a sore throat and diarrhea - bit of a weird combination. The 3rd person's symptoms started 5 days after exposure. Was it covid? Should we have been isolating? Who knows!

I get hormonal headaches every month. I know they're hormonal. It would be a complete waste of everyone's time to tell me to stay at home and test every month.

However, if you are like the pp who usually doesn't get headaches, that is different. But can't you just lie and say you have a cough and get a test if you are worried?

It's really tricky. I read this in local news this morning:

*They said: “Our data shows that the most commonly experienced early symptoms are actually headache (82%) and fatigue (72%) - and this is the case for all age groups.

“Only 9% of COVID-positive adults aged 18 - 65 didn’t experience headache or fatigue.”

Despite these high levels, only 1% of people reporting fatigue and/or a headache on the app ended up testing positive for Covid.*

You cannot add runny nose.
Kids in nursery/ primary would be constantly tested and there would be a shortage of swabs.
Stomach upsets could be a multitude of reasons, most ppl are well within 48 hours.
And who doesn't get a sore throat at some point in winter.

Those symptoms dont go together to make any viral illness.

Ppl with Covid are likely to get the main symptoms even if they dont start with them.

These are the symptoms we test for in Melbourne. I get what you are saying that some are just normal but you use your judgement. I have had my son tested for a runny nose that I knew was a cold but didn't test myself for a runny nose that was due to hayfever because it came with the itchy eyes and constant sneezing so I knew what it was.

And COVID TOE!!!

But it'd be far too late to test if your only symptom is COVID Toe as it tends to follow the infection, rather than be an early symptom.

Me and my family would never be out of isolation if we had to test for every runny nose,headache, upset stomach, sniffle and sore throat and I suspect many families are the same. Its simply not sustainable in reality.

Our secondary school has just started asking parents to isolate children with these symptoms after an out break that spread because children were presenting with fatigue, headaches and sore throats.

We had covid back in March. I had it really mildly. I started with a pain in my lung and an evening of continuous coughing. But, I'm asthmatic so put it down to a flare up of my asthma. The next day my temperature was up at 38. My symptoms were strange and changed constantly. My DH became ill 5 days after me. He started with a 'migraine' He does suffer with migraines. He was very unwell and ended up in hospital. He had so many symptoms!
I work in a primary school and this week we've had our first positive cases. Kids are having bad diarrhea and I'm trying to let the school know it's a symptom but I'm being told I'm wrong 🙄 This virus is much more than cough, temperature and loss of smell/taste!

Torvean - NONE of the children in my class or year group so far testing positive have had "classic" symptoms
ALL have had a snotty nose. Most have had tummy ache and upset.

Our local authority are inviting anyone to get tested for any of the following alongside the usual symptoms.

Headaches
Aches and pains
Feeling very tired for no good reason
Sore throat
Runny nose
Sneezing
Sometimes ‘tummy ache’ in children

I agree. Me and 4 of my colleagues have tested positive in the last two weeks. They have got to roll out testing more. Funnily enough when my friend was called by track and trace she was asked why she didn't test sooner if she was achy etc? Crackers!! This is why it's spreading. Because people are just walking around thinking they have colds. I could tell mine wasn't a normal cold. Weird symptoms I never usually get. Just goes to show the stats will be wayyy off what the actual figure is because of this.

My friend says 80% if the population have had it, according to some research she read.

Also just been looking at the chart the BBC has.. where it compares cold/flu/covid symptoms. It says 'no' for sneezing with covid-19. I've never sneezed so much in my life.

Our school has listed lots of other symptoms and said not to come in with those, such as a tummy upset.
Lots of kids have tested positive here without a temp or cough but tummy upset and sore throat!

Yes op, couldn't agree more!
We have unhelpfully swung the other way to being embarrassed to get a test in case we take it off someone else.

Utterly ridiculous.

Our primary is strictly enforcing the gov guidelines and don't want us to keep dc off for any other reasons.