The other night i was out in the rain and cold for a few hours and got home and started to feel ill – i woke up the next morning with all the regular cold-type symptoms and have felt under the weather for a few days now. It made me think – is this the same as ‘catching a cold’ from someone else and would i be able to pass this ‘illness’ on, or is it something different with similar symptoms?
In: Biology
I’ve always been told if you get sick from being out in the cold, that you were probably sick to begin with. Your immune system can be lowered in those conditions making it easier for it to develop into a cold. Someone answer this like I’m 5 because now im also curious
You cannot get a cold from being outside. A cold is caused by a viral infection. “Catching a cold” is what we call being infected with a virus that causes cold symptoms.
In your case, the fact that you were out in inclement weather before you felt the symptoms was a coincidence. Someone else had already infected you days prior. It’s possible that being out in cold weather can slightly suppress your immune system and make it harder for your body to fight the virus, but if you hadn’t been infected, being out in bad weather would have had no effect on you.
It’s not possible to catch an illness from weather. A cold is a viral infection. It’s the same reason you can’t catch Covid from going out into the rain alone. Has to come from another person one way or another.
What many people don’t understand about illness is the incubation period. It’s possible to be exposed to a virus and get sick 2 weeks later. Even food poisoning, although faster, typically takes at least 72 hours to take effect. It’s almost impossible to get it from something you ate earlier that same day.
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You don’t get a cold from being outside when it’s cold or damp out. Colds are a virus, caught through the air or transferred by other surfaces — similar to how COVID spreads.
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