Cough won’t budge? Social distancing may be to blame

COUGHS that will not go away may be caused by one infection after another, after social distancing weakened the nation’s immunity, experts have warned.

Prof Kamila Hawthorne, chairman of the Royal College of GPS, said doctors had observed that the current round of respiratory infections seemed to be lasting longer than usual.

The college has noticed rates of lower and upper respiratory tract infections are well above the average normally seen in winter.

This is echoed in weekly data from the UK Health Security Agency, which has found high rates of flu and other respiratory viruses.

Prof Hawthorne said: “It’s not clear why some of the current respiratory infections going around do seem to be lasting longer than usual – this has been noticed by doctors as well as patients, but we are not entirely sure why this is happening.

“Most of the public have been socially isolated during the last two winters and this appears to have reduced their resistance to infections – this seems to make it more likely they will pick up infections than in previous years.

“So, in some cases, it may be a matter of picking up one infection after another. They are all different and getting over one type of infection does not give immunity against another one.”

Experts said any cough lasting longer than three weeks should be investigated, as it could be a symptom of lung cancer.

NHS figures suggest that the flu season may now have peaked.

Statistics for the week ending Jan 8 show 3,984 people were in hospital with flu – more than a quarter down from the 5,447 the week before.