What Are the Most Current COVID Symptoms? Here’s What You Need to Know in 2022
When the pandemic first hit, most people memorized the symptoms of COVID-19. But the virus has morphed over time and, with that, the symptoms have changed as well.
According to a new report, current COVID symptoms are actually more similar to what you’d expect with the common cold. The report comes courtesy of the ZOE Health Study, which is a research project from scientists at Massachusetts General Hospital, the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, King’s College London, Stanford University School of Medicine and the health app ZOE. The Health Study released an updated list of the top COVID symptoms reported by study participants last week, and it’s a little surprising.
So, what are the 2022 COVID symptoms to have on your radar? Here’s the deal.
What are current COVID symptoms?
ZOE’s latest report is a review of data collected for 30 days up until Dec. 5. Here are the COVID symptoms that researchers found are the most common, in order of how often people with the virus experience them:
Sore throat
Runny nose
Blocked nose
Sneezing
A cough without phlegm (aka dry cough)
Headache
A cough with phlegm (aka wet cough)
Hoarse voice
Muscle aches and pains
Altered sense of smell
What’s the official list of COVID symptoms?
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has an official list of COVID symptoms, but it hasn’t been updated since October. It also doesn’t list which symptoms are most common of the bunch. According to the CDC, these are the most common symptoms of COVID:
Fever or chills
Cough
Shortness of breath or difficulty breathing
Fatigue
Muscle or body aches
Headache
New loss of taste or smell
Sore throat
Congestion or runny nose
Nausea or vomiting
Diarrhea
What do doctors think?
Thomas Russo, M.D., a professor and the chief of infectious diseases at the University at Buffalo in New York, says he’s “a little surprised” by the findings of the latest ZOE report. “Fatigue didn’t even make the top 10—what’s that all about?” he says. “Almost everyone I talked to that’s had COVID has had COVID fatigue.”
But experts say the rest are similar to what they’ve seen in patients. The altered sense of taste and smell “is much less common with Omicron,” Dr. Russo says. “It was much more common with the Alpha and Delta variants,” he says.
Infectious disease expert Amesh A. Adalja, M.D., a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, says he’s also seen these symptoms reported by patients. “Anecdotally, it has become more common for people to report upper respiratory symptoms and sore throat is very common,” he says. This, he says, may simply be due to the way the Omicron variant impacts the upper respiratory tract, as well as a reflection on changing immunity through people either getting the COVID-19 vaccine or already being infected with the virus.
What to do if you develop COVID symptoms
It’s hard to say for sure if you have COVID if you happen to develop symptoms. “It is challenging to try to distinguish a common cold, influenza, and RSV from COVID—no doubt,” says William Schaffner, M.D., an infectious disease specialist and professor at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. “You really can’t tell them apart.”
If you develop symptoms of COVID, Dr. Schaffner recommends that you get a home COVID test and use it. “If you’re high risk for complications of COVID-19 or are caring for someone in a high-risk group, you ought to have a low threshold for testing,” he says. Dr. Adalja agrees. “As sore throat and runny nose are common symptoms that can be caused by a number of different pathogens, it is important to first test for COVID,” he says. (With so many illnesses swirling, it’s also just easier to test for COVID at home before moving on to next steps that involve a doctor’s visit, Dr. Schaffner points out.)
If your COVID test is negative and you’re feeling lousy, Dr. Russo suggests reaching out to your doctor to get tested for the flu. The reason: If you have the flu, you can take an antiviral medication like Tamiflu to minimize your symptoms and lower your risk of complications, but you’ll have to get started on it within 48 hours after your symptoms develop to have the best chance of it working.
In general, Dr. Schaffner says the latest COVID-19 symptoms simply “reflect” the Omicron variant. “Omicron generally causes milder infections,” he says.
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