Coronavirus – every symptom you need to be aware of including red toes and hiccups
1. A high temperature
Like a dry cough, a high temperature is what the NHS and other health organizations such as the World Health Organization (WHO) say is a common symptom.
According to the NHS, this means you feel hot to touch on your chest or back (you do not need to measure your temperature).
2. A dry cough
Perhaps the most recognizable of the Covid-19 symptoms, given how different it can sound compared to a typical cough.
The cough is generally new for you – or different if you generally have a smoker’s cough – and persistent.
More often than not it will last for at least half a day or longer.
3. Sore throat
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently updated its symptom list to include a sore throat.
However, this smyptom appears to be quite rare. “Currently, we estimate that sore throat occurs in about 10% of coronavirus cases,” Michael Lerner, MD, a Yale Medicine laryngologist told Health.***.
4. Loss of taste and smell
The official UK guidelines were recently updated to include a loss of taste and loss of smell as coronavirus symptoms.
The NHS explained: “A loss or change to your sense of smell or taste – this means you’ve noticed you cannot smell or taste anything, or things smell or taste different to normal.”
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5. Headaches or delirium
Experts say many coronavirus patients admitted to hospital have complained of neurological symptoms, such as headache, confusion, seizures, and even strokes.
Delirium usually affects patients who require ventilator support, and is caused by a build-up of carbon dioxide in the body.
Neurologist Dr Kevin Conner said the majority (80%) of patients on intensive care units will experience some level of delirium.
Worryingly, delirium can lead to long-term brain damage, while patients who experience it are also less likely to survive, according to the experts.
While delirium is a well-known side effect of coronavirus, some experts believe that its treatment is being mismanaged.
6. Needing the toilet more
A mild symptom of coronavirus that is being reported with increased regularity is the need to go to the toilet more often.
Dr Diana Gall explained to the Express : “Digestion problems and changes in bowel habits – particularly looser stools and making more frequent trips to the toilet – are sometimes the first signs that you’re coming down with something, not just with this coronavirus.
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“However, diarrhoea has been reported as an early symptom in patients who have later tested positive for Covid-19.”
A new study, published in the American Journal of Gastroenterology, analysed data 204 patients with Covid-19 in China’s Hubei province and found nearly 50 per cent had diarrhoea, vomiting or abdominal pain.
7. Testicular pain
Another slightly less common symptom of the coronavirus, is testicular pain.
Researchers from Harvard Medical School filed a case report about a 42-year-old man who tested positive for the virus, after going to hospital with a ‘stabbing pain’ in his testicles.
While doctors could find nothing wrong with his testicles, and CT scan showed damage in his lungs.
Two days later, the man was diagnosed with Covid-19.
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8. Lack of appetite
To varying degrees those who have caught the coronavirus have complained of losing their appetite.
While some may be just a little less intrigued by their food than usual, others, such as racing blogger Stephen Power, have no desire at all to eat.
He believes he contracted the disease while at Cheltenham Festival.
The North West London man said: “I’ve been in bed with a nasty fever, headache, mild cough & back pain for nearly four days now, I’m completely exhausted and have no urge to move or eat.”
9. A buzzing sensation
One of the more curious symptoms is a buzzing sensation that runs through the body.
While it has not been listed as an official symptom to watch out for, many people have posted online about experiencing a ‘fizzing’ feeling.
Tarana Burke, recognised as the founder of the #MeToo movement, said that her partner had the illness and the sensation that his ‘skin felt like it was burning’.
Twitter user @Miafia described having “an electric feeling on my skin.”
Dr Daniel Griffin, chief of infectious disease at ProHealth Care Associates in the US, has suggested the feeling may be part of an auto-immune response to a patients’ nervous system.
“Clearly it’s been identified, but we’re just not sure yet how widespread it is,” he told the New York Post.
10. Foot lesions
Medical experts in Spain are currently investigating whether those who have the virus could be identified by small lesions on the feet.
Earlier this year, The Spanish General Council of Official Podiatrist Colleges shared a statement revealing that several coronavirus patients had lesions on their feet.
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The statement said: “They are purple lesions (very similar to those of chickenpox, measles or chilblains) which usually appear on the toes and normally heal without leaving a mark.”
They added that it was a “curious finding” which had also been observed in “numerous” Covid-19 patients in Italy and France, as well as Spain, according to dermatologists and podiatrists.
The lesions were more commonly noticed in younger people with the virus, including teenagers and children, although some adults were also found to have them.
11. Stomach ache
As with a loss of appetite, enduring a tummy ache may easily be passed off as a sign of something more innocuous.
However, a newly published study by the American Journal of Gastroenterology links tummy problems to Covid-19.
They found that 48.5% of 204 people who have been infected by the coronavirus in China’s Hubei province had digestive symptoms such as diarrhoea that can cause tummy pain,
12. Mental fatigue or ‘brain fog’
Although this has not been officially chalked up as a symptom, Covid-19 sufferers have reported experiencing mental fatigue.
Thea Jourdan told the Mail that she first thought she may have been infected when she got a tickle in her throat and a headache.
The mum-of-three then began to experience brain fog.
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“Initially I felt exhausted, as if I was dragging myself through treacle and had no choice but to go to my bed. I had no meaningful cough and I wasn’t running a fever,” the Hampshire woman told the publication.
“But I had a peculiar sensation of something settling deep within my lungs, almost like breathing in talcum powder.”
Others have also reported struggling to hold on to thoughts or remember things throughout the day.
13. Difficulty catching your breath
If your chest starts to feel tight or you cannot breath, you may have caught the coronavirus.
Most young people or those without pre-existing health conditions are unlikely to experience this symptom.
Dyspnea – the term for when someone has difficulty breathing – may be coupled with a tightness in the chest, rapid breathing and heart palpitations.
14. Sore eyes
The best way to describe the sensation of burning eyes is to compare it with the itchiness and irritation you would face if you suffer with hay fever or other allergies.
This kind of itchiness and irritation can also come about when you’re among smog, smoke, dust, mold and even animals.
The only difference between these cases and the cases described by coronavirus patients, is the fact that the virus triggers this symptom and not an external factor like pets.
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15. Shaking with chills
Cold chills are a symptom patients have complained from, but it is quite rare.
In a study, based on 55,924 cases in China from the date the virus was first spotted to February 22, 11.4 percent of coronavirus sufferers reported feeling chills.
16. Muscle or body aches
The CDC updating its guidelines this week, to include muscle or body aches to its list of Covid-19 symptoms.
New York University researchers found a link between sore muscles and serious Covid-19 cases during an analysis of 53 patients in Wenzhou, China.
Megan Coffee, the infectious-disease expert who led the study, said deep muscle soreness, known as myalgia, were often exhibited by patients.
However, Professor Coffee said she would ask a patient about shortness of breath before other less serious symptoms, such as body aches.
17. Persistent hiccups
Doctors are warning persistent hiccups could be a possible new symptom of coronavirus.
A report published in the American Journal of Emergency Medicine describes the case of a man who tested positive for the deadly disease after having hiccups for four days.
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The 62-year-old, from Chicago, had initially showed no other symptoms, and had a temperature of just 37.3C.
But a scan on his lungs showed indications that he was struggling with his lung capacity.
The man was put in an isolation room where he was tested for coronavirus. His temperature later increased to 38.4C.
The report stated: “Here we present a case of persistent hiccups as the presenting symptom of a Covid-19 infection in a 62-year-old man.
“To our knowledge, this is the first case report of persistent hiccups as the presenting complaint in a Covid-19 positive patient in emergency medicine literature.”
18. Hearing loss
Researchers from John Hopkins School of Medicine have revealed that the virus can infect not only the nose and throat, but also the ear and mastoid bone of the skull.
In their study, the researchers analyzed three patients who had died from coronavirus – a man in his 60s, a woman in her 60s and a woman in her 80s.
virus in her right middle ear, while the man in his 60s had the virus in his left and right middle ears, as well as in his left and right mastoids.
In the study, published in JAMA Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg, the researchers, led by Dr Katilyn Frazier, wrote: “This study confirms the presence of SARS-CoV-2 virus in the middle ear and mastoid.”
While the sample size for the study was very small, the findings indicate that ear issues, including a loss of hearing, could be a sign of coronavirus.
NHS England
