With shots and infections, the most common COVID symptoms have shifted
Enlarge (credit: Getty | David Jones)
As people build up immunity to SARS-CoV-2 through vaccines, boosters, and infections, the most commonly reported symptoms of COVID-19 have shifted, making the deadly pandemic infection more difficult for many people to distinguish from standard cold-weather viruses.
That's according to recent survey data collected in the ZOE COVID Study, an app-based study with over 4 million users that was created by researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard University, King's College London, and health science company ZOE.
Since COVID-19 emerged, the common symptoms that have topped standard lists include fever, chills, a persistent cough, and shortness of breath. As the virus spread around the planet, loss of taste and smell were also reported as telltale signs. But these days, those symptoms are almost completely absent from the top five.