COVID-19 early symptoms may differ among different age groups & genders, says study

As the world continues to grapple with the pandemic, a study led by researchers from King's College London said that the symptoms for early COVID-19 infection may differ among age groups and between men and women. This new research was published in The Lancet Digital Health.

Study says COVID early infection symptoms may differ

Stating that these differences are most notable between younger age groups (16-59 years) as compared to older age groups (60-80 years and over), the study said that men have different symptoms compared to women during the initial days of infection. The study further said that men were more likely to report shortness of breath, fatigue, chills and shivers. On the other hand, women during the early days of COVID infection are likely to report loss of smell, chest pain and persistent cough, it added. 

The lead author of the study from King's College London, Claire Steves, said, "It's important that people know the earliest symptoms are wide-ranging and may look different for each member of a family or household."

For this study, the team of researchers had analysed data from a COVID-19 symptom study app between April 20 to October 15. They had also modelled the early signs of infection and successfully detected 8% of cases while using 3 days of self-reported symptoms. After this, the researchers also compared the ability to predict early signs of COVID-19 infection using a type of machine learning. 

This Machine Learning model was able to incorporate some characteristics about;2 the person affected such as age, sex, and health conditions and showed that symptoms of early COVID-19 infection are different among various groups. Informing that 18 symptoms were examined in the study, which had different relevance for early detection in different groups, the study stated that the most important symptom for the earliest detection of COVID-19 overall included loss of smell, chest pain, persistent cough and abdominal pain, blisters on the feet, eye soreness and unusual muscle pain. 

Remarking that the loss of smell in people over 60 years of age and was not relevant for subjects over 80 years of age, adding to it the study said that other early symptoms such as diarrhea were key in older age groups (60-79 and over 80). It further added that a known symptom of the disease was not an early feature of the disease in any age group. 

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