According to UK Department of Health, Covid-19 symptoms are not limited to fever, continuous cough and loss sense of smell but other additional symptoms some ‘may be similar to cold or flu‘, writes the BBC News.

The UK Health Security Agency reportedly updated its Covid guidance to include a sore throat, muscle pains and diarrhoea.

General practitioners have always said that symptoms should include a headache, sore throat and runny nose. Those are the symptoms that we have been seeing in people from the start of the pandemic – I am not sure why this is being announced now – it is confusing for the public.

– Dr Frances O’Hagan, British Medical Association (source: BBC News)

The UK Department of Health told the BBC News “Covid-19 symptoms ‘may be similar to the cold or flu‘ and ‘may vary for different age groups or different variants of the virus‘ “.

• New Covid symptoms ‘may be similar to cold or flu’
• UK Covid symptoms list expanded with nine more signs of illness

Rachel Hall of The Guardian writes that updated guidance include nine more sign of illness including shortness of breath, feeling tired and loss of appetite. The full list of new symptoms listed in NIH website are:

• Shortness of breath.
• Feeling tired or exhausted.
• An aching body.
• A headache.
• A sore throat.
• A blocked or runny nose.
• Loss of appetite.
• Diarrhoea.
• Feeling sick or being sick.

The symptoms are very similar to symptoms of other illnesses, such as colds and flu.

Referring to a tweet from Prof Tim Spector, the lead scientist of the Zoe Covid-19 symptom tracker app, The Guardian writes “NHS had “finally changed” the symptom list after two years of lobbying. ‘Pity they have the order wrong, but it’s a start and could help reduce infections’.”