wondering if the start of the UK pandemic was earlier than officially disclosed?

[firthy85]

hello. just seen a zombie thread from 1 january last year with people talking about having this awful hacking cough, lethargy and vomiting. posters saying that they had been suffering with this virus since october/november 2019 but was just put down to a normal seasonal chest infection. when the media started to report that coronavirus had come to the UK and we saw the first cases wondering if any of the posters over on that other thread or in fact you, got a test when you started to hear about it?

I had a nasty, painful pleurisy in October 2019 and coughed all November - sometimes to the point of uncontrollable retching. I was totally exhausted, ached all over from the extent of coughing, it was horrendous, vile.

The English SW anecdotally had a lot of the mystery hacking virus at the end of 2019.

MIL had a nasty respiratory virus before christmas 2019, and a work colleague was off work for a couple of months with respiratory issues before christmas 2019, we were all quite worried about her. It has crossed my mind that it could have been covid, but I guess we will never know. It could equally have been something else.

I doubt the first official death, was the first death though. In the same way that patient zero was unlikely to be the first case.

Am sure what we had over christmas 2019 was it. Really bad dry cough that lasted until after feb half term, feeling ill and temperature for about 2 weeks at the start, and feeling like I was drowning when I lay flat, even though the cough was dry. Chest pain on one side from coughing for about 8 weeks, and have been left with a permanent wheeze and shortness of breath that I didnt have previously.

We had a horrible virus in November/December 2019, with symptoms that would now lead you to suspect Covid, including my DS completely losing his sense of taste/smell.

A high percentage of my DCs’ school were off at the same time and we have a school newsletter from then, which talks about the school having been told by PHE that there was an unidentified virus circulating that was causing many more people to be ill than would be normally be expected for that time of year.

I know a family who live in a European country (not the UK) who are sure they had it in November. They are a fit, sporty family who live in a sunny climate which is an international hub. All 5 had hacking coughs, fevers and felt rough for a week. The older teenagers had it milder than the adults.
I don't believe it started in China in December.
Has it been disproven that international military athletes got it at the games in Wuhan a couple of months earlier?

My daughter’s school was hit hard by something in Nov/Dec 19. Her teacher said he hadn’t seen anything quite like as many absences all at once ever in his career. It was a respiratory virus with fever and gastro symptoms.

In 2020 my DD was in hospital. Talking to one of the nurses, just random chit chat, she commented that in Dec 19 they had a much higher number of respiratory paediatric patients than normal, whose swabs for all the usual viruses they swab for all came back negative. So it was something, but none of the ‘known’ viruses at the time. She suspected covid.

I had something hideous in Oct/Nov 19, as did DH, that totally floored me. No idea if it was covid but I coughed until my head felt like it would explode and slept for weeks on the sofa. I generally don’t get that ill with viruses.

My DH was ill in Dec /jan 2019 -2020
It went on for a long time and I remember him clearly saying that if my Dad or someone elderly got it it would probably kill them .
He did a video call with a doctor who kept asking him if he smoked ( No never ) as it was like he had a nasty chest infection and he had a really nasty cough .
He got antibiotics but that didn’t do anything .
He was able to do stuff like walk the dog but it completely exhausted him and he’s a very very fit healthy 53 year old .
We were supposed to go out on Boxing Day to big party and he was to ill to get out of bed .
We went on holiday in Feb as planned and while there he lost his sense of taste and smell but didn’t think anything of it
By March he was ok

But until the thing about loss of taste and smell was mentioned as a symptom I assumed it was a bad chest infection . But now I definitely think it was Covid

I've just remembered - this cough was so unusual because normally a chesty cough eventually loosens up and you can cough it out and clear it. It never cleared, just an endless dry cough cough cough hack retch, yet the heaviness in the chest never cleared.

Ugh, it was awful. Sisyphean.

It was almost certainly here earlier than the official date, and no doubt some of these cases being mentioned were covid.

But people do die from other respiratory illnesses every year. Pneumonia. Flu. All sorts of stuff. Many of these cases will have been normal seasonal illnesses. You only have to look at the positive test rate back at the start when only those with suspected cases were being tested. The positive rate was still pretty low.

It must’ve been here sooner. My dd had a high temperature and cough in late feb and was off school for two weeks. It was an awful cough.
Ds was really unwell in late feb in his first year of uni. The cough lasted a month in the end but the scariest for him was the high temperature and loss of taste/smell and being away from home.
Another family member who works in central London had a very bad flu like illness with a cough and visited Christmas Day. I remember thinking I don’t think he should’ve come!
And finally, a friend of mine in his early 70’s went into hospital in February with a leg problem. Died three weeks later with a pneumonia like illness.
So yes, too much of a coincidence

I had it over December 2019/Jan 20. Horrible cough, no energy, awful brain fog, feverish, kidney pain that came and went, loss of taste and appetite. No child symptoms (no runny nose, sneezing etc and a none productive cough) . I thought it had gone twice, only to return.
It took 5 weeks to start to feel better and a further month or more before I felt more normal. Several other

I still cough if I exert myself or laugh a lot and I'm prone to silent kidney infections now.
I haven't had covid since it started to be recognised as such, to my knowledge.

@BJHair but why would he have lost his sense of taste and smell 2 months after catching covid if that earlier illness was covid? It’s much more likely he had another illness then caught covid on holiday which presented with loss of taste and smell.

I'm convinced we had it over Christmas 2019. It was like flu except no aches and pains. And a cough lasting for 3 plus weeks. It was like no other illness we've ever had before.

It went around the local primary school like wildfire. One third of my child's class was off ill with it at one point.

My ds1 was hospitalised in December 2019 with a viral chest issue. The nurses were commenting on the unusual number of kids with viral chest infections

Dh had a horrendous cough and chest infection end of 2019, that left him with a bad cough for ages. It wasn't covid- he had that this year. I had a bit of a cough with covid, but nowhere near as bad as the bout of flu I had 6 years ago, where I was too exhausted to even read.

It was the headache and fatigue that did for me with cv. And the chest pain, but then, the aftermath of colds have left me coughing my guts up for weeks. And I'd honestly rather have cv again than the sinusitis that had me crying at the nurse in ooh. I'd rather childbirth again than sinusitis like that

I was in hospital late December 2019 and I had all the classic Covid symptoms including a terrible relentless cough that left me breathless and unable to even speak because each time I tried it brought on a coughing fit. I remember the nurse telling me to take deep breaths because my blood sats were too low and if they didn't go up she would have to call the doctor. Not an easy task when you are gasping for breath
I wasn't actually hospitalised because of the cough - it was because of abdominal internal bleeding caused by a coughing fit.
Pre Covid times by just a few weeks so no Covid test done.
I was wiped out for months with fatigue, breathlesness and lung ache - going well into March/April 2020 and spent quite a few weeks on the early 'lungs on fire' threads on here.

We had a raging temperature, a cough that took weeks to feel better. My boy's lips even went blue even though he was really, really hot.
I was coughing so hard I was pissing myself so much that I had to wear super size pads and change them every hour as they were soaked through.

Just as an extra bit here, my family all had whooping cough and reading some of these stories I do wonder whether that’s what some have had. It starts with feeling fluey and then the cough continues for about three months at the most unless you get antibiotics very quickly after catching it (which is hard as a lot of it goes undiagnosed)

I can only speak for myself that mine was unlikely to be whooping cough as I've been re-vaccinated (booster) only years before. Had the annual flu jab also.

Friend had the "virus from hell" in October 19. She reckons she caught it from someone who coughed on her, while telling her she had had the "virus from hell" for 5 weeks, after returning from Milan.
Friend has seen an ENT consultant who reckons it was probably Covid. Friend still has symptoms (long covid).

October, family member had flu symptoms which developed into pneumonia and spent a good few weeks in hospital. Returned home and was re-admitted 2 weeks later with the same thing. It followed the pattern that emerged once it was commonly reported. We are sure that is what it was, people were passing away as we sat there and being wheeled out.

I had a hacking dry cough for about five weeks in Feb 20. Awake every night coughing for hours. No other symptoms just a horrendous dry cough all the time.

I hadnt been abroad or anything.

This is both anecdotal and speculative, but my super fit late-20's cousins came home from skiing in Italy last January and quickly went down with pneumonia, one was hospitalised.

And when I say 'super fit' I mean, competitive athletes, in peak condition (unlike me).

Ive wondered this, both me and DH had a terrible cough at the end of Nov 19. We both felt wiped out then this awful heavy cough that kept us awake for a couple of weeks, made us cough until we were nearly sick.
It was definitely much worse than your average cold/cough.