Have you been infected by Covid-19? What is it like?

I'm a retired programmer who does ride sharing in Silicon Valley. I often pick up people at the San Jose airport. Sometimes they are coming in from China or Seattle. I live in a Chinese neighborhood. I gave a woman who couldn't breath a ride to the emergency room. When I got sick in February, I figured it was the flu, but now realize it was probably Covid-19 based on symptoms. I recovered nicely and have been quarantining myself just in case.

It's like the flu with the added difference that it makes breathing more difficult. Also difficulty swallowing. It was more annoying than anything, not really that bad. I don't have any health problems, but if I did have breathing issues, I imagine it might be very problematic.

Have 4 family members that have been tested positive for COVID-19 in Austria:

- Male (56), no symptoms except weak voice

- Female (55), no symptoms

- Male (80), light fever (37,7C), weak voice

- Female (81), no symptoms

These cases are all connected, and we have talked with others that seem to have caught the same variant/mutation. None of them does really show symptoms, no hospitalizations, no real fever, and no hard breathing. Hope this is a light variant/mutation, and the situation stays the same for them.

I was not tested although I went to the doctor 4 times over 5 weeks. I went to Milan from Munich in January. Upon returning to Munich, I was hit with a sudden, dry cough. It was noticeably different from anything I had experienced before. I went to bed and woke with a fever of about 102. It lasted for days and I developed a very strange lung issue. On every exhale it sounded like 1000 pop rocks going off in my upper lungs/throat. The sound was loud enough to wake me. I “recovered”, with lasting lung issues for about two weeks. A week later I developed another fever that lasted 3 days. I then had intense night sweats for 2-3 weeks.

If I had it, it would go against many of the models of when it reached Milan. If I didn’t have it, I had some other monster illness that hit the lungs hard.

Symptoms as described by WHO:

- https://i.cbc.ca/1.5496615.1584111464!/fileImage/httpImage/i...

- https://sm.mashable.com/mashable_sea/photo/default/coronavir...

It might be worth taking a look on Twitter. This doctor is 'live' tweeting his experience with the disease including lung scans [1]. Based on some other first hand experiences I've read on the Twitter/News people's experience varies wildly. Some people say it's not much worse than the flu. On the otherhand I saw a tweet from one doctor who had it claim it was worse than child birth so seems like the variation in experience can be massive.

[1] https://twitter.com/yaletung

A recurring symptom mentioned here is difficulty breathing. That's terrible and can easily cause harmful feedback loop. I'm mid-30s so I will try to defer medicinal interaction for as long as possible. To self-assess the seriousness of breathing issues I intend to make us of a pulsoxymeter.

Is there somebody here who could suggest a rule set for when to seek help?

Something like: seek help if SpO2

- between 85% and 90% for more than 48 hours

- between 80% and 85% for more than 24 hours

- below 80% immediately

(actually I do feel mildly ill and as if breathing is a little bit more uncomfortable than usual - but according to my pulsoxymeter SpO2 is at healthy 98% with a pulse around 60 bpm. so everything seems perfectly fine)

One Finnish entrepreneur describes his so far mild infection: https://perjantaikokki.fi/2020/03/14/greetings-from-a-corona...

I hesitate to post this because I haven’t been tested, but I can’t help but wonder. I live in Tokyo. 3 weeks ago I woke up in the middle of the night vomiting, and had a ~38.5C (101F) fever for 2 days. Muscle aches, very fatigued etc, but no real breathing problems - basically a tougher-than-average flu. I went to the doctor and tested negative for influenza. The policy at the time in Japan was not to test for COVID-19 unless the patient had a cough. My wife came down with the same symptoms a couple of days later and had an intermittent 38~9C (102F) fever for three days, and also tested negative for influenza (we both have flu shots every year, if that’s relevant). A couple of weeks later we (plus 2yo child) all have cold-like symptoms and a cough, and are keeping ourselves isolated. It isn’t possible to get tested now unless we have a fever, so who knows. Our child has not had a fever at all and seems quite cheerful apart from a runny nose and cough. 3 weeks ago I would have had to have been quite unlucky to catch it which makes me wonder if I’m just a hypochondriac, but the timing makes me wonder. We’re all on the mend and I don’t feel there’s any need to tie up medical resources, but it would be nice to know for sure if we have / had it. Again I hesitate to write this because I don’t wish to add to the mountain of misinformation out there, but at the same time I’d be very interested to learn if anyone has had a similar experience.

‘I was stupidly overconfident’: a South Korean coronavirus survivor’s tale

https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/health-environment/article/30...

I have had a fever for a week and difficulty breathing. I have asked my doctor about getting tested for Covid19 and they have declined to test me because I don't meet the critical criteria: age > 60, around large groups of people, etc.

I run in circles with someone that returned from Italy and has been confirmed to have Covid19. I'm assuming I have it.

The fever isn't so bad for me but there have been a few times where I thought I would die from not being able to breath. There is only one thing I did that helped with the breathing but it fits in the old wife's tales category so I wont post it here since I don't want to be mocked for it. We used to the same thing 10 years ago to get my Mother-in-law off the ventilator when they told us she would never get off.

Today is day 6 since the fever started and the fever is gone today, still feeling weak.

Here is an interview with one of the first patients in Germany: https://www.br.de/radio/bayern1/coronavirus-in-bayern-100.ht...

The interview is in German but maybe Google Translate can help. His symptoms however have been very mild.

34 year old healthy male, non smoker and no relevant medical conditions. Not tested [govt policy] but it's a completely unfamiliar infection of the lungs picked up in a major European city, so go figure...

No proper fever [some of my sleep is the slightly fitful sleep I'd associate with fighting off mild infections, but my temperature is normal or very close], I've coughed only a literal handful of times and not painfully, so clearly sufficiently mild to miss those characteristic responses, no headache and only occasional feelings of fatigue and a bit more sleep than usual. Just inflamed lungs which are more uncomfortable than painful. Back when I felt completely healthy last Wednesday and went for a 3k outdoor run (no more uncomfortable or slower than I'd have expected considering I haven't run much this year) I obviously felt like I was breathing a bit too shallowly and breathing deoxygenated air at the end. This is basically that same feeling coming back the following day, except with a normal breathing rate [and heart rate]. I can still take a deeper breath whenever I want and I'm far from worrying I'm about to run out of oxygen, but just feels uncomfortable and I can imagine how it can cause much more serious problems for people with more severe symptoms, pre-existing lung conditions or immune system issues. It's been steady for the last five days.

After reading a lot of reporting about this, it isn't clear to me if Covid-19 is the name of the virus or the disease or both.

I realize that for laymen (like me) it doesn't really matter. But academically speaking, is there a difference?

Sky News ran an interview with a woman in London diagnosed with Covid-19: https://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-london-woman-who-caug... It doesn't seem like something that can really be spotted based on the symptoms, which is probably why it's so hard to contain.

According to the danish health authorities, the symptoms include: Fever, airway infection/breathing problems, chills, muscle aches, sore throat, headache, diarrhea and vomiting.

As far as I can tell they’re listed in order of frequency. As for “airway infection” they mention dry cough and runny nose.

From what I can tell the symptoms are more or less similar to a regular seasonal flu or a common cold, but with much more severe outcomes for some.

I was sick couple of weeks ago and symptoms were very similar to Coronavirus and my doctor dismissed the need to get tested for Coronavirus because I didn’t travel to any of the hotspots. I am feeling better now but I will never know if I had the virus.

Request: for those who report positive tests, please advise if they were told whether active virus was found or just viral DNA (contagious vs not), and sample source (oral swabs, anal, both).

Yet to see a post from someone healthy who can say:

- Had covid

- Had shortness of breath

- Recovered

- Back to running now

- No notable lung capacity issues post recovery

Not saying they are not out there.

I would be rather interested if anyone tried zinc supplements. I do get that Choloquine is ideally should be also part of regimen, but since it's prescription only, so you can't simply get it.

FYI everyone, you're going to get a huge selection bias here. The kind of infected person who's going to see and answer this question will likely have symptoms on the milder side. Answers here should not be expected to be remotely representative.

Take good care

Your comment about not being older than 60 to get tested made me so angry and shows how fucked the US is. Testing has nothing to do with protecting you (the current treatment for Covid-19 is the same as any other severe respiratory illness), it's about deciding who needs to be quarantined and have their contacts tracked to protect other people. While the severity of symptoms varies by age, the transmissibility does not.

The numbers are many multiples of what is being reported.