Welcome back to Wednesday's with Dr. Haas! This is a segment where you can ask questions about your top COVID-19 health concerns and Dr. Haas, our resident health expert (and a world-renowned Infectious Disease Doctor) answers them! Today, we are answering Fall’s top questions:
How do we know if it’s the a cold? The Flu? Or COVID?
Yep, it’s that time of year again, where the common cold, the flu, COVID-19, and also RSV join together as the Four illnesses we are fighting this Fall. Many symptoms overlap between them, but a few warning signs set the illnesses apart. Overlapping symptoms include: sore throat, runny nose, cough, headache and body aches. Loss of taste and smell is a common warning sign of a COVID-19 infection, even if some studies suggest it’s less common with the now-dominant BA.5 variant.
Another typical COVID-19 symptom, that is less typical with the flu or a cold, is diarrhea. Keep in mind that for kids however, diarrhea is a common sign of the flu.
And finally, with recent BA.4 and BA.5 variants, a COVID-19 symptom present in older adults is confusion.
While watching and knowing the symptoms of the Four is important, really the BEST way to know the
difference is to test yourself: Keep COVID-19 rapid tests on hand and test whenever symptoms begin.
Are the rapid tests working with the new variants? How do we know?
Studies have been done to show that rapid tests still work to detect all variants. The limitation remains that no home test can tell you which variant you have.
Is there a new variant that is escaping the previous immunity? Escaping immunity provided by the vaccine?
There is good data showing that the new bivalent booster is offering protection against severe illness and hospitalization for all Omicron related variants. And Omicron variants are still causing the majority of infections in the US. If you want to read more on this, here is an excellent article: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2022/10/25/1129196088/covid-new-omicron-variants-immunity
This is a good time to also talk about Monoclonal antibody treatments or MAB. While tests and boosters are still working how we want and need them to, there is evidence showing decreased effectiveness for MAB treatments.
“The subvariants BQ.1 and BQ.1.1 are likely to be resistant to bebtelovimab, and the subvariants BA.4.6, BA.2.75.2, BF.7, BQ.1, and BQ.1.1 are likely to be resistant to tixagevimab plus cilgavimab (Evusheld).”
If you need more information, here is a good article:
Which variants are affecting my area?
Community members can view which variants are currently causing infections in their area. We are in Region 8.
CDC COVID Data Tracker: Variant Proportions
Does the booster start to function more rapidly than the original dose (took two weeks to become fully effective)?
Studies done on the original booster showed that it reached full effectiveness at 11 days. Studies were done to show that the bivalent booster was fully effective after one month. We don't know for certain if the bivalent booster is effective sooner, but I suspect it is.