A British writer and academic has shared what it's like to have COVID-19, calling the virus "particularly cruel".
Shiraz Maher, an expert on Islamic radicalisation who advises the UK Government, took to Twitter to describe what it feels like to be infected with the "completely mad, crazy illness" of coronavirus.
"Firstly, it's not the flu," Maher wrote, adding that whoever originally made that comparison "did everyone a great disservice".
"This thing is not the flu. It's a nasty, horrible illness."
The 38-year-old wrote that he had at first debated about whether to go public on having been infected with the virus, but said he decided to open up about his experience to help people who were worried they had also caught it.
He said even though he had no underlying health conditions he had been taking the virus' spread "pretty seriously from an early stage" and initially wasn't sure he had it.
"I started having symptoms about two weeks ago. The fever was mild and went very quickly. Is it COVID-19? Who knows, but I've shaken it quickly. Great," he wrote.
"Then my lungs started packing up and my chest got very tight."
One of the worst aspects was the cough, he said, which was "dry and unlike anything I've ever had before".
"It feels like there's something deeply lodged within your lungs, that you're (violently) trying to eject. Of course, there's nothing to actually eject."
The cough was "dusty, dry and painful," he said.
Once the coughing stops a new phase begins: "You're fighting to draw air into your lungs but your chest is tight and, frankly, your lungs are in distress.
"Your head is also pounding because of the violent coughing."
After consulting various doctor friends, he was told his case was "classic COVID-19".
Then, just as he thought he couldn't take it anymore, Maher says he started to improve.
"I thought I'd got through the worst of it and things were looking good," he wrote. But he was wrong.
"Coronavirus is particularly cruel. Recovery is not linear." A day later, he says, he was feeling "distinctly unwell again".
His blood pressure then spiked and his doctor friends advised him to call an ambulance.
After waiting for 15 minutes to speak to someone and tell them he had COVID-19 he was told by the "overwhelmed emergency services" that they couldn't help him.
"Ultimately they decided they couldn't respond to my call. I am not criticising the London ambulance service. They are doing superb work under incredible, unprecedented circumstances," he wrote.
With no ambulance care coming, Maher said he then consulted his doctor friends about how to lower his blood pressure himself, and spent the next 48 hours in bed.
It was only after his blood pressure slowly returned to normal that his symptoms "started evolving into a less severe cough" and a less tight chest, though a new batch of symptoms including "crazy abominable pains and headaches" followed.
"Today we're approaching the end of 2+ weeks since I first developed symptoms and about 11-12 days since they became particularly acute. For the first time, I feel like I'm starting to beat it but I'm nowhere near feeling 100%," he wrote over the weekend.
"Coronavirus appears to have a completely different trajectory in different people. I can't spot a pattern."
In summing up his experience, Maher said COVID was a "completely mad, crazy illness" that made him fear for his life.
"I've lost several days of my life to this illness. Many, many other people will lose their lives to it. This virus continues to spread everywhere and you - literally, you - can help stop it with the most basic of efforts.
"Wash your hands. Stay at home. Do it now."
