NP here who easily catches crap at the office. I run an air purifier and a fan at my desk, and wash my hands and use hand sanitizer. It's not as good as a mask but it helps and it's socially a better trade-off (for me) than masking.

I also mask when I'm sick, if I can't stay home. So far it hasn't encouraged anyone else to do the same, but I live in hope.

Folks, washing hands is good, as well as not ever touching your face before you wash your hands, but that's not going to touch the viral mist in the air. If you have to work in an open office, the only way I have found to reduce illness is mask.

Anonymous wrote:It’s allergy season op. Are you sure you and they aren’t suffering from allergies.

It’s allergy season op. Are you sure you and they aren’t suffering from allergies.

Start by washing your hands more frequently. It sucks but most people do not get enough sick leave.

Fed RTO caused some employees to decimate their leave balances just trying to survive with new sometimes very long commutes and having to use much more leave simply to attend a doctor’s appointment etc.
I wouldn’t be surprised if this results in more people going to the office while sick.
That said, I am full time WFH and still got a really nasty long lasting cold this month.

Use this over the counter allergy nasal spray (studies on preventing Covid, flu, and rhinoviruses) about 3 times a day when you go to the office and maybe up to 5 if someone there is sneezing or coughing. Keep hand sanitizer around and wash hands frequently and it should reduce most of your colds:
https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/covid-19/antihistamine-nasal-spray-prevents-covid-19-study-finds

Anonymous wrote:How are you getting to the office? I'm all for taking Metro, but that is a total petri dish. Wash your hands when you get to the office & home, avoid sitting next to people who are obviously hacking up a lung, etc.

+1. I don't mask, but I aggressively move around as needed. A quick cough is OK if it doesn't sound like you're hacking up a lung, but on that second cough, I move to a different part of the car. Same with sniffles/sneezes.

Its not normal but I certainly believe its happening. Wash your hands and take vitamins are the only things I can suggest.

Ive had years when this is me. This year I haven't been sick at all though so Im sure my time is coming.

How are you getting to the office? I'm all for taking Metro, but that is a total petri dish. Wash your hands when you get to the office & home, avoid sitting next to people who are obviously hacking up a lung, etc.

Unfortunately, yes. Which is why I wear a mask all day when I go into the office at this point. I do have an autoimmune disease,.so it was not unusual in pre mask days to catch 2 colds a month,no was always sick.

Covid also tends to suppress the immune system for quite a while after you have it, so you could be looking at that as well.

Yes

Yes, when people aren't considerate and will not stay home. They touch the door handles, bathrooms, etc and it passes.

I don't know.

But I have had two upper respiratory viruses in the last 6 weeks or so. One of them mild, one of them very nasty. I almost never get sick and have been sick twice recently. So stuff is just going around.

I work at a very small company with a tight office space and we go in 2x a week and people come in physically coughing and sneezing pretty frequently
- it’s been especially bad the last couple months and I’ve now caught my second cold in less than 2 months. The person i work closely with also had it. Is this normal? I do have lots of coworkers with little kids