doctors have identified a dangerous disease that prevents Russians from taking sick leave

Recently, doctors identified an unknown infection, due to which Russian patients are forced to sit on sick leave for 3 months. This was reported by the Rossiyskaya Gazeta publication.

It is reported that patients first develop symptoms of a common cold: fever, weakness, runny nose, sore throat and loss of voice. Then a cough appears that lasts for weeks. Even after you feel better, the cough will not go away. Patients claim that their test results for influenza and COVID-19 may be negative.

As it turns out, Russia is not the only country where such “lingering” infections are reported. According to WHO estimates, symptoms persist not only during the long course of COVID-19, but also after ordinary acute respiratory viral infections – in 20% of those who have recovered from the disease. The journal Clinical-Medicine a month ago published the results of a study by scientists from Queen Mary University of London. There they conducted a survey among 10 thousand people who had been diagnosed with COVID-19 and other respiratory infections, as a result of which it turned out that aching joints, asthenia and prolonged cough after exiting the acute phase of the disease continued to bother patients both after the coronavirus and people with ordinary ARVI.

“There is no evidence that the “strange” disease that is being complained about both in Russia and abroad is caused by some new virus. <...> Hints on this topic that flash in the press are unfounded – at least until a new pathogen is discovered. <...> Rather, we can talk about the simultaneous circulation of several respiratory infections at once – in addition to influenza and Covid, this is also respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), mycoplasma and others,” says Alexander Gorelov, deputy director for scientific work of the Central Research Institute of Epidemiology, academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

Both Russian and American clinical guidelines state that patients with microplasma do not need antibiotic treatment, except in cases where the immune system is weakened or the disease is severe.