Have you ever had a cold you just couldn’t shake for weeks on end—one that definitely wasn’t COVID?
“Long COVID”—lingering symptoms after a SARS-CoV-2 infection that can last for weeks, months, or even years—is a thing.
“Long cold” may be a thing, too.
That’s according to a new study released Friday by Queen Mary University of London, published in The Lancet’s EClinical Medicine. Researchers asked hundreds of recently ill patients who had been recovering for four weeks or longer what symptoms they had during recovery. Some had COVID, and others had another acute respiratory infection, they generalized as a cold. Those conditions included:
Pneumonia
Flu
Bronchitis
Tonsillitis
Pharyngitis
Ear infection
Common cold
Other upper or lower respiratory infection not caused by COVID
Some of the most common symptoms in patients who had recently experienced an acute respiratory infection included:
Coughing
Stomach pain
Diarrhea
And some of the most common symptoms in patients who had recently experienced COVID included:
Problems with taste or smell
Lightheadedness or dizziness
Otherwise, the lingering symptoms of both were largely the same, and included:
Stomach problems
Muscle or joint pain
Sleep problems
Memory problems
Difficulty concentrating
“Our findings shine a light not only on the impact of long COVID on people’s lives, but also other respiratory infections,” Giulia Vivaldi, lead researcher on the study, said in a news release about it. “A lack of awareness—or even the lack of a common term—prevents both reporting and diagnosis of these conditions.”
“As research into long COVID continues, we need to take the opportunity to investigate and consider the lasting effects of other acute respiratory infections.”
Those who were more severely ill during their infection tend to more frequently report long-term symptoms. Otherwise, research is ongoing to figure out just why some develop “long” illnesses and others don’t.