Study finds four new symptoms of Covid-19
These additional symptoms also occur in diseases like migraine, heart problems and diabetes, and are therefore confusing to the people
Hyderabad: Chill, loss of appetite, headache and muscle-ache are the new four symptoms of Covid-19, a study by the Imperial College of London, which covered a million affected people, has concluded.
The study was carried out from June 2020 to January 2021. It showed that some of the other symptoms were often not taken into account by the affected.
Experts in India state that they are getting tests done only after they identified symptoms of cough, cold, fever and diarrohea in patients. On investigation, they also find the patients suffered from loss of appetite, muscle ache and headache.
These additional symptoms also occur in diseases like migraine, heart problems and diabetes, and are therefore confusing to the people. “Many of the affected do not even remember, until asked, as to what triggered their illness.”
Senior internal medicine specialist Dr R. Raghu explained, “Fever is often the last symptom in many SARS-CoV-2 patients. Till the onset of fever, tests are not done. With so many different symptoms, it is difficult for the people to understand whether they are suffering from Covid.”
The stigma of the disease is a reason why people are not willing to speak up about their symptoms. Often, it takes a lot of investigation in patients with mild symptoms to understand whether they are indeed suffering from Covid-19.
There have been cases where tests on the first day are negative and lungs empty; but, after two days, lungs are completely filled with the virus.
With the UK and South African variants, these new symptoms need to be followed up. India’s travel restrictions have helped control the spread of these two variants. There are mutations within and it is important to monitor them.
A senior scientist at the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB) in the city said, “Very few cases are reported in our medical bulletin. This creates a psychological breather among the people. The panic has disappeared, and this is good; but, the safety precautions must not be given up.”
Sporadic cases are being noted and it is important to not allow these to form into huge clusters. There are still un-reported and also asymptomatic carriers who are moving around. This means the virus is active.”