If you cough and have a fever, you will immediately think of Covid-19: You can catch a dangerous disease

The fact that the Omicron variant is gradually taking over has made Covid-19 spread widely in the community.

This partly leads to the psychology of having suspicious symptoms such as cough and fever that people believe that they have Covid-19. As soon as symptoms appear, many people buy self-medication drugs, even abuse antibiotics and antiviral drugs while there are no confirmed results of Covid-19 infection, as well as without a doctor’s appointment.

According to Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Tien Dung – Former Head of Pediatrics Department, Bach Mai Hospital, this is an alarming situation.

“Currently, many people who have symptoms that are a bit like Covid-19 will immediately think of Covid-19, but forget that there are still many other diseases that can cause similar symptoms,” Associate Professor Dung said.

According to this expert, when it comes to respiratory diseases alone, scientists have identified 28 pathogens and Covid-19 is just one of them.

Currently, we are also in the epidemic season of respiratory diseases. Therefore, when there are symptoms such as cough, fever, the patient can completely have other diseases instead of Covid-19.

In addition to creating unnecessary worry and wasting quick tests, Assoc. health risks.

“For example, people abuse the antiviral drug Molnupiravir. In fact, this drug inhibits the virus very well, but it also has side effects. The drug is contraindicated in children, pregnant and lactating women. Therefore, do not use Molnupiravir arbitrarily and need a doctor’s prescription. Now many people are afraid to have to take medicine, but in fact many diseases heal on their own without the need for drugs. Even in the case of confirmed cases of Covid-19 but mild symptoms, it is not advisable to take too much medicine,” Assoc.

Associate Professor Dung also cited that the patient showed symptoms similar to Covid-19 but may have had dengue fever. If not properly examined and diagnosed, but arbitrarily treated according to the regimen of Covid-19 will be very dangerous.

“Recently in Ho Chi Minh City, there was a case of a pediatric patient being tested SARS-CoV-2 positive but also positive for dengue. This is a very dangerous case because the two diseases are completely different in terms of treatment. If Covid-19 focuses on treating the lungs, dengue fever focuses on transmitting a lot of fluid, “Assoc.

More dangerously, in the case of dengue fever, using the antipyretic drug Ibuprofen can lead to serious consequences. Specifically, Ibuprofen has an anticoagulant effect that makes bleeding caused by dengue fever uncontrollable, especially gastrointestinal bleeding. Therefore, if we use Ibuprofen, dengue fever can be much worse.

Besides, Assoc. Prof. Dung also recommends that people with underlying diseases such as diabetes, high blood pressure, etc., do not be so afraid of Covid-19 that they forget about the existing disease in the body.

“If we focus too much on Covid-19 and forget about controlling and treating underlying diseases, they can ’emerge’ and sometimes be much more dangerous than Covid-19,” Assoc.

In this expert’s opinion, SARS-CoV-2 develops according to the laws of the epidemic. That is, when the new virus appears, the virulence is very high, but when it spreads, the virulence will decrease, so the people who get it later have only mild symptoms and gradually the asymptomatic rate is very high. In addition, most people have been vaccinated with enough doses of the Covid-19 vaccine. It is for these reasons that people should not be unduly worried about Covid-19.