No one is immune to common cold, it is the most common viral disease to humans. Anyone can catch it, there is no cure for it yet and it is difficult to prevent it.
It’s communicable and you easily can get infected because its causative agents are there and part of our environment.
Despite the fact that contracting a common cold demand one for a lifetime immunity against the virus it takes beyond our lifetime to discover and develop an anti viral medication or a vaccine against the disease.
There are various viruses that can cause common colds and all find it easy to enter the respiratory tract through droplets and aerosolized particles.
Despite its widespread occurrence, it is generally a very mild and self diagnosed illness that subsides spontaneously in a few days to a week even without treatment. However, any cold like illness that persists more than a week necessitates consultation with a physician.
Physicians say that it is actually difficult to diagnose a common cold because its non specific signs and symptoms like nasal congestion, watery nasal discharge, sneezing, itchy throat, mild cough, headache and body malaise are also present in the early phases of many serious diseases affecting the respiratory system.
Moreover, secondary bacterial infection sometimes complicate the common cold. A change in the color and character of the nasal discharge from watery to yellowish or greenish is a sign of possible secondary bacterial infection.
Presently, the standard regimen for the conditions, aside from rest and liquid intake, it also includes decongestants or antihistamines to relieve the nasal conditions and discharge and analgesics to relieve the headache and body pains.
There is no effective preventive measure against the common cold and there is no vaccine it yet developed because the numerous causative agents and mild course of the illness makes it impractical to develop one.
