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Health Check: Can the common cold prevent Covid?

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Woman blowing her nose

2021/03/24 GMT

Can the common cold prevent Covid?

BBC World Service - Health Check, Can the common cold prevent Covid?

Can a cold prevent Covid, mental health in Covid medical staff, and our amazing heart.

Can a cold prevent Covid; mental health in Covid frontline health workers; black women and fibroids; our amazing heart.

Claudia talks to her guest Dr Ann Robinson about a new study from the University of Glasgow in the UK  that suggests the virus that causes the common cold can effectively boot the Covid virus out of the body's cells. Some viruses are known to compete in order to be the one that causes an infection and researchers have discovered that it appears cold-causing rhinovirus trumps coronavirus. The benefits might be short-lived but rhinovirus is so widespread it could still help to suppress Covid. 

Mental Health in Covid frontline health and social care workers.  Claudia hears from Dr Talya Greene about a new study showing that nearly 60% of health and social care workers working in the UK during the first wave of Covid have suffered from either anxiety, depression or post traumatic stress disorder.  What can we learn from the  impact of Covid on the mental health of  hospital and social care staff in order to help build resilience for future traumas.

Azeezat Olaoluwa reports from Nigeria looking at something that affects many women in Africa: uterine fibroids.  These are non cancerous growths that develop in or around the womb. It’s a medical condition that affects black women more than any other race, making it an unavoidable health condition for a large percentage of black women.  

Heart Surgeon Dr Reinhard Freidl talks to Claudia about his new book “The Beat of Life” about why, to him, the heart is so much more than just a pump, and why being broken hearted is a recognised medical condition.

Image: Woman blowing her nose
Credit: LaylaBird/Getty Images


Presenter: Claudia Hammond
Producer: Alexandra Feachem

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