The United Kingdom’s Health Security Agency updated its guidelines for COVID-19 to include nine new symptoms.
The new symptoms include shortness of breath, feeling tired or exhausted, an aching body, headache, sore throat, blocked or runny nose, loss of appetite, diarrhea, and feeling sick or being sick, the BBC reported. The National Health Service noted that these symptoms are “very similar to symptoms of other illnesses, such as colds and flu,” according to their official website.
Most people in the United Kingdom don’t have access to free testing for COVID-19, according to the government health website.
Apparently there has been much debate about precisely what symptoms should be officially recognized to allow someone to receive a COVID test, the BBC continued, and “feeling sick or being sick” made the cut.
The island nation has experienced record high COVID infections in the last month, with 4.9 million Brits testing positive for the virus (roughly one in every 13 people), the BBC reported in another article Friday.
We’ve been sharing the wider symptoms of COVID for almost 2 years because we were following the science, provided by the amazing ZOE contributors! NHS finally recognising that there are more -hopefully now people are aware it help bring down COVID numbers from record highs https://t.co/WojuaXUBXG
— Tim Spector MD (Prof) (@timspector) April 4, 2022
The surge in new cases was attributed to the new Omicron BA.2 subvariant and “people mixing more,” according to the BBC. The NHS told Brits to “stay at home” if they feel sick.
King’s College London professor Tim Spector told the BBC that he had been campaigning to have the list of COVID symptoms expanded. Spector and his team spent the last two years tracking data from the COVID-19 app “ZOE,” the BBC reported.