sore throat, fever and cough more common than in Delta. The data – breaking latest news

I symptoms of Covid triggered by the variant Omicron coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 are, in part, different from those that are seen in the cases behind which there is the variant Delta of the virus. To certify it – after weeks of anecdotal experiences and preliminary studies – is a report published by the UK Health Security Agency on January 14: a report based on a very large database (about 180 thousand cases of Omicron, about 88 thousand cases of Delta).

The major premise is that there are no updates about the severity “Intrinsic” of the infection caused by Omicron compared to that of Delta. It is not even clear yet whether theincrease in hospitalizations in the pediatric range which is found not only in Great Britain, but also in the United States and Italy, is linked to the peculiar characteristics of the variant.

Another decisive premise is that vaccines offer very high protection: “After the third dose”, we read, “the protection offered against serious illness is 92 percent, and drops to 83 percent after two and a half months” (much more significant is the decrease in protection against contagion and transmission, which drops from 65-70 percent after the third dose to 45-50 percent 10 weeks after the “booster”: but it should be remembered that vaccines are designed primarily to block the heavier effects of the disease, not the transmission).

Symptoms and comparison

The research behind the report is based on responses from a huge number of symptomatic patients, who were asked to list if they had one or more of fever, coughshortness of breath, fatigue, muscle aches or joint, runny nose, sneezing, headache, loss of taste and smell, sore throat, eye irritation, loss of appetite, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea.

The comparison shows that sore throat is much more common among “Omicron sufferers”: it was indicated in 53 per cent of cases, compared to 34 per cent in “Delta patients”.

The loss of taste and smell is much less common: it was reported in 13 per cent of “Omicron patients” and in 34 per cent of “Delta patients”.

In Omicron patients, the fever and the cough, while fewer symptoms likeeye irritation or runny nose.

Impossible – of course – to deduce from symptoms such as sore throat whether or not you have Covid, explains the report.

This confirms what Tim Spector, professor of genetic epidemiology at King’s College in London, had noticed at the end of December, who had noted that “three” classic “symptoms of Covid – high fever, persistent cough, loss of taste and smell -” were «Less frequent in the face of the increasing diffusion of the Omicron variant».