Have you had it?

[OnMyWay]

I thought I posted this last year, but I sure can't find it.

In other topics, I speculated that I think many Filipinos have already had Covid.  Maybe expats too.  Some new anecdotal evidence seems to support that.

--  An expat I know was sick last week.  He doesn't think it was Covid.  The main reason was that he thinks he and his wife already had it a few months ago.

--  A neighbor told my wife she thinks their family had it a few weeks ago.  One of her symptoms was loss of smell, among others.

--  A relative in Manila is sick right now and thinks she has it.  She has been sick for a week and is almost better now.

--  Many people who have symptoms similar to regular colds / flu will just stay home (hopefully) and get better.  Those are not reported.  Most people who have mild symptoms want nothing to do with quarantine or hospitals.

--  Many cases are asymptomatic and many of those go unreported

--  I'm not sure about NCR, but locally here that vast majority of new cases are found through contact tracing, and the majority of those have mild or no symptoms.  SBMA employees seemed to be linked into a lot of local cases and SBMA is really into testing.  E.G., an office in SBMA has one employee get sick, and SBMA tests the whole office.  They get a few more hits.  Then a few days later, Olongapo reports "case #1203 is a relative of SBMA employee who had Covid, and tested positive today.  She/he is presently asymptomatic and in our quarantine facility".

There are good and bad aspects to all of the above.  One good aspect is that all of the unreported cases would help build herd immunity.

One other strange thing came up.  An Olongapo resident has on their list last week.  Case #1150 or something like that.  They mentioned that this same person was also case # one hundred something last year.  Caught it twice.  I'm a bit suspicious of this as I don't think the testing is accurate.

[Snowy79]

I don't know anyone in the Philippines that has had it but I know a few ex Forces friends that were found positive on routine testing. They said being quarantined was worse than Covid as they never knew they had it until tested.  Another good friend had it bad but wasn't admitted to hospital, just told to  stay at home and he would receive a call daily to check up on him.  He was strugling to breathe and said at times it was pretty frightening. 

[JJReyes]

There is speculation that many become infected with Covid-19 without showing symptoms.  Unless there is universal testing, we will never know the true numbers.  Besides, it is really not important.  What you want to following is infections that become severe requiring hospitalization and number of deaths.  The reason for testing to determine positive or negative is to prevent spread.

[OnMyWay]

5 minutes ago, JJReyes said:

There is speculation that many become infected with Covid-19 without showing symptoms.  Unless there is universal testing, we will never know the true numbers.  Besides, it is really not important.  What you want to following is infections that become severe requiring hospitalization and number of deaths.  The reason for testing to determine positive or negative is to prevent spread.

Mostly agree.

What I don't understand is this.  Why would our local leader be encouraging people to get tested at p3800 a pop?  This is from her FB.  Why would someone who is feeling fine want to be tested?  Especially with the tests not being 100% accurate? And if you are negative, and no vaccine is available to you, a week later you could be positive.

Cases are rising.

Get tested.

Titiisin ko po lahat ng pagmumura ninyo sa akin Basta sumunod po tayo sa protocols upang wag dumami pa ang COVID dito sa atin

#HindiKailanganMagMura

#LoveNotHate

I love you Jerk Salvador

Cases are rising.

Get tested.

I will endure all your cursing at me. Let's just follow the protocols so that COVID won't increase in our place

#HindiKailanganMagMura

#LoveNotHate

I love you Jerk Salvador

[JJReyes]

I looked at data regarding the number of Covid-19 related deaths in the Philippines.  The trend is downward.  At PHP 3800 a pop, those Covid-19 tests are expensive.  

[Mike J]

Maybe.  

10 days ago I started coughing and could barely catch my breath.  Symptoms got worse and included cough, fever, shortness of breath, pain in upper lungs, headache, fatigue, muscle ache.

Sounds familiar yes?  The problem is there are no test sites here in the province.  I felt like crap, but I also do not feel it is life threating (at that point) and know that the majority of corona cases, if that is what is, do not require hospitalization.   About day 7 I began to cough up "yellow crap" and my lungs were making strange noises.  At that point my wife drove me to the doctor.  The doctor listened to my lungs and put me on strong antibiotics and cough suppressant.  I did not have fever at that time.  There was no discussion of corona.  Three days now on the antibiotics and I feel much better, no fever, very little cough, lungs feeling much better, but still a bit weak and short of breath.

My thoughts then and now were:

You either have it or you don't.  No test readily available.  In any case 95 percent of corona does not require hepatization.   But if it is corona and I go out to seek a test, see a doctor, I risk exposing other people and end up being told to go home.  Hell I am home now, why complicate the issue.  So we treated it AS IF it were corona and took as much precaution as possible.  No visitors, wear masks even in the house, separate bedrooms, eat alone, etc, etc.

The next time I go to the city I will probably get an antibody test to see if I did/do have corona.  At this point I actually hope it will be positive as I will have built up some immunity and enjoy life just a bit more.

 

 

[OnMyWay]

5 hours ago, Mike J said:

So we treated it AS IF it were corona and took as much precaution as possible.  No visitors, wear masks even in the house, separate bedrooms, eat alone, etc, etc.

I think one thing many people have learned, hopefully, is that we can do a lot to prevent the spread the usual colds and flu during the peak seasons.  These are also killers.  I'm not a fan of mask wearing, but just use common sense like you mentioned:

1.  If you are sick, stay home.  I worked 10 years straight without taking a sick day, when I was young.  That was stupid.  I went to work sick many times and was never thinking about others getting sick.

2.  Wash hands a lot.  I will be keeping hand sanitizer stocked now.  After I had kids, I was always worried about them getting sick.  When I got sick, I was very careful about spreading in the house, and I would sanitize door knobs, etc., and no hugging or kissing.  Most of the time it worked.

3.  Avoid coughing around others and learn to cough in a safe manner.

I'm sure there are others but these are some of the big ones.

[Guy F.]

13 hours ago, Mike J said:

Maybe.  

10 days ago I started coughing and could barely catch my breath.  Symptoms got worse and included cough, fever, shortness of breath, pain in upper lungs, headache, fatigue, muscle ache.

Sounds familiar yes?  The problem is there are no test sites here in the province.  I felt like crap, but I also do not feel it is life threating (at that point) and know that the majority of corona cases, if that is what is, do not require hospitalization.   About day 7 I began to cough up "yellow crap" and my lungs were making strange noises.  At that point my wife drove me to the doctor.  The doctor listened to my lungs and put me on strong antibiotics and cough suppressant.  I did not have fever at that time.  There was no discussion of corona.  Three days now on the antibiotics and I feel much better, no fever, very little cough, lungs feeling much better, but still a bit weak and short of breath.

My thoughts then and now were:

You either have it or you don't.  No test readily available.  In any case 95 percent of corona does not require hepatization.   But if it is corona and I go out to seek a test, see a doctor, I risk exposing other people and end up being told to go home.  Hell I am home now, why complicate the issue.  So we treated it AS IF it were corona and took as much precaution as possible.  No visitors, wear masks even in the house, separate bedrooms, eat alone, etc, etc.

The next time I go to the city I will probably get an antibody test to see if I did/do have corona.  At this point I actually hope it will be positive as I will have built up some immunity and enjoy life just a bit more.

 

 

Under those circumstances I'd head for the nearest good hospital and do my best to avoid exposing others along the way. From what I've read the 'Rona is a miserable way to die- one of the worst. It's like very slow drowning.

[Mike J]

9 minutes ago, Guy F. said:

Under those circumstances I'd head for the nearest good hospital and do my best to avoid exposing others along the way. From what I've read the 'Rona is a miserable way to die- one of the worst. It's like very slow drowning.

For us the nearest real hospital is about three hours away.  But I see your point.  But even as crappy as I felt it didn't feel life threatening at the time.  Coughing up "yellow crap" and worsening chest pain was the deciding factor to seek medical. I was fairly certain at that point I had a lung infection at best, perhaps pneumonia or even worse. 

[Heeb]

23 hours ago, Mike J said:

The next time I go to the city I will probably get an antibody test to see if I did/do have corona.  At this point I actually hope it will be positive as I will have built up some immunity and enjoy life just a bit more.

 

 

I thought about that too but from what I'm reading the Philippines treats the a positive antibody test as a covid case, you would have to then have the RT-PCR test to prove you don't have the virus currently, which brings me to the subject of travel to the U.S. Passengers are required to get a negative covid test within three days of departure "The negative pre-departure test must be a viral test (RT-PCR or Antigen) that was conducted on a specimen collected within 3 days prior to flight departure from a foreign country" The problem I see here is that if you opt for the antigen test you might pop positive for a case of covid that you already recovered from in which case you then have to prove you no longer have the virus, this is from PAL's website, I don't know if they reworded it or it came from the state department this way.

• • The test result states “NEGATIVE”, “SARS-CoV-2 RNA NOT DETECTED,” “SARS-CoV-2 ANTIGEN NOT DETECTED” or “COVID-19 NOT DETECTED.” A test marked “invalid” is not acceptable.  
• If passenger has recovered from COVID-19, passenger must provide a written documentation of recovery from COVID-19 after previous SARS-CoV-2 infection in the form of a positive viral test result and a letter from a licensed health care provider or public health official stating that the passenger has been cleared.
  • The document of recovery from COVID-19 means that the passenger has presented documentation of a positive test result and a signed letter on official letterhead that contains the name, address, and phone number of a licensed healthcare provider or public health official stating that the passenger has been cleared for travel;
  • The positive test occurred within the last three months (90 days) prior to flight departure to the US
  • Personal identifiers (e.g. name and date of birth) on the positive test result and signed letter match the personal identifiers on the passenger’s passport or other travel documents;
  • The test performed was a viral test; and
  • The test result states “POSITIVE”, “SARS-CoV-2 RNA DETECTED”, “SARS-CoV-2 ANTIGEN DETECTED,” “COVID-19 DETECTED.” A test marked “invalid is not acceptable.

• This Order applies to all air passengers, 2 years of age or older, traveling into the US, including US citizens and legal permanent residents.
• Any flight entering the US, even for a connection, will require testing before departure.
• All air passengers traveling to the US, regardless of vaccination status, are required to provide a negative COVID-19 test result or documentation of recovery.

My wife and I have tickets for mid April and it feels like back to the future right now trying to get ready to get out of here, Manila is locked down again, inbound flights are restricted, covid test needed, travel pass from BI needed, getting out of here is a dicey affair, I will definitely get the RT-PCR rather than the antigen test but it could take a day or so to get the result and what if a false positive happens.