• Doctors are sharing the five symptoms of the Omicron variant that members of the public shouldn’t ignore.
During a TV programme in UK, Dr Amir Khan explained that those treating Omicron patients have noticed five distinct new symptoms.
Speaking with host Lorraine Kelly on ITV, Dr Khan said that people should look out for ‘a scratchy throat, mild muscle aches, extreme tiredness, a dry cough and night sweats’. He went on to clarify that these would be the sort of ‘drenching night sweats where you might have to get up and change your clothes’.
Dr Khan continued:
This is important and it’s important that we keep on top of these symptoms. If we are going to track Omicron and track it worldwide, we need to be able to test people with these symptoms.
If they go onto the NHS website and say they have night sweats and muscle aches, they may not be able to book a PCR test.
So we need the NHS website to keep up with these symptoms. So people can book a PCR test and we can keep track of numbers and symptoms.
Dr Angelique Coetzee, hair of the South African Medical Association who was among the first people to suspect the fast-spreading Omicron strain has also noted these same five symptoms while treating patients at her private clinic.
As reported by the Daily Star, Dr Coetzee stated that she first alerted health officials of a ‘clinical picture that doesn’t fit Delta’ on 18 November, after seven patients displayed different symptoms which appeared ‘very much related to normal viral infection’. Unlike the Delta variant, patients also didn’t experience any loss of taste or smell.