Just checking, you can't have SF without a temperature, can you?

[FlightAttendant]

Ds1 has had a hacking cough for at least 3 days now, coldy, feeling rotten etc. He has gone to school but it is still quite bad. No temp at all really.

I feel like I am getting the cough too since Monday but have suppressed it, and just feel very bunged up, ears hurt a bit, bit of a headache etc. I also feel quite sick since yesterday and have no appetite.

I wondered if it might be SF - several of the mums have had it but also I think there is probably a nasty cough/cold virus going round as well...many of the children are coughing I think.

So just checking really. I don't normally feel this sicky with a cold iyswim.

Not that I want to take tamiflu anwyay but interesting to compare symptoms with those who have ahd SF.

There are loads of nasty viruses around at the moment, colds and tummy bugs, every week since the beginning of term one two or three of my children have been home ill! I think with SF you would have a high temperature for a good few days.

Thankyou Belgo. I am sorry your progeny have been afflicted.

It is that damp time of year isn't it. I feel slightly less sick now I have had a breadstick. I think when you lose your appetite you kind of reach a critical point where it's do or die iyswim

hope you get well soon!

According to this sitewww.cdc.gov/H1N1flu/qa.htm you can have swine flu WITHOUT a fever. DD1 is in bed with suspected sf and has a normal temp. GP swabbed her yesterday but I won't get results till next week and until then I have been told to assume she has it. Hope you feel better soon.

Thankyou both...hope your dd is better soon too, Ludog. Can I ask why they thought it was SF, please?

She has a very bad cough, sore throat,headache, generally miserable and feeling weak. There have been a good few confirmed cases in her school as well.

Ah thankyou...well, I have no idea if we have confirmed cases among the kids or not - certainly one of the mums was confirmed I think - but she's not someone I regularly chat with.
I think it'd be lucky for me and ds both to have SF without a temp, though I do feel awful so I wonder.

Hope dd is better soon.

As you are young, you would expect to have a temperature with swine flu, because your immune system is efficient and creates a temperature to fit the infection. Elderly people often don't have a high temperature despite being very ill,; due to the way their immune system reacts; but young people, especially children, you would expect them to have a high temperature with the flu.

Could be just a very nasty cold. Hope you are feeling better today.

thanks Belgo, am about the same but taking it quite easy...

btw...young? [laughs] Does it count that I feel about 90?

I came on here to start this very post - my DD has identical symptoms to her best friend, whose mother and sister are both ill, but my DD's temperature has just staggered up to 36.2 from 35.5 today, while friend has a fever and has been prescribed Tamiflu (which her mother didn't particularly want).

I'm not too concerned about DD just now, but she is asthmatic, and I think if I were sure she had the flu I might want her to take Tamiflu.

She almost never has a temperature, neither do I - I even bought a new thermometer today in case the old one wasn't working properly. Could we just have very low base temperatures?

Will see how she goes on, anyway.

oh poor thing

I am sorry she is so poorly. I think tamiflu is only automatically given out if you have a high temp, well if you are an adult and do the online thingy that is...it just asks if you have a high temp and all the other stuff, and if you had all the other stuff but no temp it would say feck orf

(done it to me twice)

but not sure how it is given out to children and by individual GPs. I think it can have horrid side effects anyway so may be better to wait it out unless she gets worse.

Have you managed to speak to your GP today? I hope she is feeling alright.

hope your ds is better FA, but why are you sending him to school when he still feels bad? Just wondering.

Minky, forgive me, when I said 'quite bad' in my OP I meant that his cough is still quite bad, and he is rather tired and fed up. But he wanted to go to school and was Ok, apparently, it was Tuesday that he coughed all day - or so he told me.

'quite bad' for ds generally means not particularly happy, as he is usually pretty cheerful.

I'm also under threats pressure from school after a fair bit of absence last year, so am generally sending him in unless he has a temp or D/V, and letting them decide when they have had enough of him. that way it isn't my fault.

I usually give him the choice and he will often feel crappy on waking but then want to go after a bit of brek.

She doesn't seem too bad this evening - will see how she is in the morning.

FA - I know what you mean about side effects, but I don't want this to make her asthma much worse. It's not terribly serious and is well-controlled at the moment, but in the past she has been wiped out for most of the winter by a couple of colds.

It is a defining feature for the NHS helpline at the moment, but I wonder if that's to do with balance of possibilities and resources. Will phone GP if I think it really is flu. The one advantage of having it in the summer, is that there are fewer other viruses to confuse it with.

Pyrocanthus, I read an interesting thread about a possible association of below normal temps.and swine flu. It was either flutrackers.com or flu wiki if you want to Google. Absence of a fever in the presence of other sympoms does not rule out swine flu.

Thanks Chamomile, I'll google around.

HI, sorry you feel so rotten.
If it helps, we all had confirmed swineflu n the summer holidays, as did a lot of our friends. All our symptoms, adults and kids alike were as follows..
temp 38c ish, sore throat, dry cough and tightness in the chest (I presumed like asthma feels).Fatigue, if I climbed the stairs I felt worn out. The kids slept a lot.It lasted 5 days.

Oh and abroad, they dont think its a big deal whatsoever unless you have a heart or lung problem prior. They think UK has gone crazy over this.

Hope this helps? We didnt ask for the tamiflu.

ok, cool, wasn't judging.

Thanks lavender - it does feel like that but no temp, still - just horrid throat and wanting to couch all the time but knowing it'd just make it worse and hurt!!
Am not feeling so sicky now though which is good

Minky - fwiw I'm glad you pulled me up on that.
I am usually very anxious not to send him in if he might not feel well enough, but since the summer when we had all the hassle with the HT I have been probably less inclined to keep him at home if it is just a cough or cold - not because I think it is right to send him in but because I've been told to and so has everyone else, so basically he catches everything because other people send in their slightly ill kids, and hopefully I'm not judged for doing the same though it makes me very angry that the school is so utterly horrid about the whole thing.
Especially as they have announced a new policy of allowing 10 days of authorised absence for holidays now so it's fine to take them off abroad but not ok to keep them at home if they are knackered from a night of coughing, or still able to spread infection among their friends.
Don't get me started btw...

that is cough, not couch. What is couching anyway?

It doesn't sound like a brilliant idea to pressure people into sending their children in when there's an epidemic about, FA, it would annoy me too.