How often is 'just a cold' actually covid?

[lookingformyleopard]

My mil is absolutely adamant that she only has a cold. She's snotty and has a headache, but she hasn't been out for a week. I've never heard of a cold with a 7 day incubation period.
I'm not imagining reading that loads of people have been snotty and turned out to be positive for covid?

There's a medical paper covering how someone working at the South pole in winter got a cold after 17 weeks there. The common cold virus can be latent for months.

The only people I know who have had a "cold" in the past 12 months have had miserable doses of "flu" with all the Covid symptoms but not tested positive for weeks. 1-2 negative tests, the cold that just won't buffer off and then a positive yet three weeks in.

For everyone else it's Covid. In my personal experience.

She should be tested like everyone else should. But she's bulletproof (like my MIL) so it shouldn't possibly be Covid.

@PrincessNutNuts

I've heard of about a dozen men in their 40s who have been "absolutely wiped out by this cold." "He's never ill usually but he's been laid up in bed for three days now"

Various symptom profiles, some more covid-like than others - nobody apparently even considers the possibility that it could be covid. Even with a cough or temperature present.

Everyone is totally astonished when I ask if he's had a covid test.

Oh it won't be THAT will it."

I've no idea about the thought processes that instantly dismiss the pandemic that has dominated our lives for almost a year as the possible cause of unprecedented illness.

But it doesn't bode well for our recovery as a country if this is a widespread mental block.

Mind boggling isn't it.

The population of Kent is apparently being offered lateral flow tests to see what community infection rates are like. I know a very large household, all locked down where one person had totally asymptomatic Covid. It was the only member of the household who had left the house in weeks to get some groceries. They never developed symptoms and didn't pass it on within the household despite not isolating away when the diagnosis was given.
When the long term studies come out on how this bloody things works it's going to be fascinating.

@lookingformyleopard

I wasn’t having a go at you as I clearly stated. It was directed at you MIL so maybe don’t be so sensitive. You’ve posted on a public forum during the middle of a pandemic she has symptoms that might be COVID but doesn’t want to be tested.

@SunbathingDragon

More likely to be a cold than covid with a snotty nose. Any other symptoms?

Why? We are bang on in the cold and flu season

I was laid up in bed for 3 days with an awful cold over Christmas, dragged on for 3 weeks. Negative for covid. It felt like every other bad cold I've ever had. I think there has been a particularly nasty cold virus doing the rounds this winter. Not everything is covid!

Not everything is COVID. How did you know it wasn’t?

[quote KeepWashingThoseHands]@lookingformyleopard

I wasn’t having a go at you as I clearly stated. It was directed at you MIL so maybe don’t be so sensitive. You’ve posted on a public forum during the middle of a pandemic she has symptoms that might be COVID but doesn’t want to be tested.[/quote]
But is it not clear that I'm pretty pissed off myself that she's refusing a test?? I mean, instead of telling me to be less sensitive, maybe just be less unnecessarily angry and mean in your post?

@BubblyBarbara

There's a medical paper covering how someone working at the South pole in winter got a cold after 17 weeks there. The common cold virus can be latent for months.

Really? That's both fascinating and annoying. I hate colds since having kids and it means I get kept awake looking after them then when they're finally better it hits me and I'm kept awake by my own coughing and snotting!

Not everything is COVID. How did you know it wasn’t?

I literally said in my post I had a negative test, that's how I know .

@TreadSoftlyOnMyDreams

And the households where half of them get it and half don't.

And the people who bounce back into hospital with strokes/heart problems/blood disorders months after recovery.

We don't know the half of it yet do we?

@Hibernatingnation

I was laid up in bed for 3 days with an awful cold over Christmas, dragged on for 3 weeks. Negative for covid. It felt like every other bad cold I've ever had. I think there has been a particularly nasty cold virus doing the rounds this winter. Not everything is covid!

You checked. That's good. People keep acting like I'm a lunatic for suggesting a covid test. "Oh it won't be THAT, will it."

Why wouldn't it be? Best to check. People are driving me crackers.

Last year when testing wasn't available I had what I thought was an extremely bad sinus infection, sore throat beyond belief with what looked like milk spots on my tonsils and roof of mouth and mild temp.

This was right at the beginning. I then developed heavy lungs and breathlessness i put down to my cold. I had a slight cough but again - I'd had a cold.

Then lost sense of smell and developed a severe temp and extreme fatigue. This was by now middle of March so it was safe to assume covid. Then they announced loss of smell as symptom and my taste went too.

I then was exhausted for about 2-3 weeks beyond anything normal.

Now it's easy to derive I had covid and I hit the 18 day dodgy bit. But of course we'll never know.

Had my first vaccine yesterday and has heard those who had had it had awful side effects and yet I've had none. Except a reaction to the plaster 🤦‍♀️🤣

I've had a terrible cold for weeks. I can't remember a time when I've had a cold for longer than a few days. I'm on my 3rd week now of a dreadful cough with my ribs hurting from coughing so much. Have had 2 tests, both negative (both me having to do the test in a walk in testing place) and I had Covid last year so I assume I would have some protection anyway! There are horrible colds doing the rounds at the moment.

My sister had a mild cold and only went for a test after husband had temperature and headache - both tested positive, no loss of taste. She said if she had not had test she would never of thought she had had it and would have been back at work - so think it is always best to have a test incase you pass it on without realising.

My friend has had several colds. One where she was very unwell with it and still went to work, didn't isolate, didn't get tested and her child still attended school.

They had temperatures, sore throats and a rash.

I told her to get tested but she said it's just a cold and carried on as normal.

I thought I had covid. Dreadful cough. Fever. Tested negative. Just a cold after all .

@lookingformyleopard www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2130424/