If you're sick but don't have COVID, flu, RSV, here's what it may be - Insider

"The cold weather, the gathering indoors, all of that is good for respiratory viruses, and bad for symptoms," Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Rochelle Walensky said during a media briefing on Monday, stressing that multiple respiratory illnesses are here early this holiday season, challenging overstretched hospitals across the country. .

Doctors from at least three continents say that many different viruses — not just flu and COVID — are having a real "party" this year.

This year's spike in respiratory illnesses has also arrived earlier than usual, and Gulick says it's "caught people by surprise" who haven't gotten their flu shot or COVID booster.

If you have a fever and a sore throat or cough, experts like Gulick suggest getting tested for two respiratory viruses: flu and COVID.

But you could also have something else, like "the older coronaviruses, a virus called adenovirus, and of course just the common cold," Gulick said

While there is no treatment or vaccine available yet for viral illnesses like RSV, both flu and COVID are "ones that people can do something about," Gulick said, by getting vaccinated, boosted, and using antiviral medications like Paxlovid for COVID and Tamiflu for flu when they're warranted