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CarboniferousCreek t1_izkfqsl wrote

Reply to comment by mtx013 in Post viral cough: why does it get worse after you get better? by [deleted]

Thanks for your answer!

I think people are giving complex answers because I asked why the post viral cough only starts / gets worse after you start getting better or have cleared the virus.

As an example, I had mild covid a few months back (vaxxed + boosted). I hardly had a cough. I started testing negative on ag tests after 7 days. And then I got this horrible dry cough for like a week.

So whether or not I had fully cleared the virus — maybe it was still chilling in my bronchi — where was that cough when I first got sick?

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mtx013 t1_izkjprz wrote

Great question! Upper airway virus start and do their main business between up until the larynx (not necessarily with same strength on all structures, usually it's more nose/throat/sinus). They do infect our trachea and bronchi, but it's a different kind of cell lining so things are usually not too intense.

From there, we have two things happening at same time:

  • the virus is not as efficient getting into your lower airway cells, taking longer (or not! e.g. omicron COVID)

  • your immune system is not interested in being kind. The inflammatory response is meant to target infected cells, but it does damage to the surrounding environment and healthy cells.

While your upper airways are meant to be attacked and quickly recover (afterall, it's exposed to the outside world), lower airways are not, they take longer to heal and to return it's inflammatory response back to base levels.

Edit: formatting

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hands-solooo t1_izmzz8g wrote

The building only gets bullet holes once the cops show up to shoot the bad guys.

Most symptoms of infection are the immune system and not the infection itself. And considering that a big part of immune response to viral infections is to just kill every infected cell, it makes sense that some symptoms appear once the infection is under control.

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