The Guardian

‘To hell and back’: my three weeks suffering from coronavirus

Tiger Ye, 21, lives in Wuhan and started showing symptoms in mid-January. Here he tells the story of his illness and recovery
More than 75,400 people in China have been infected with coronavirus. Photograph: AFP via Getty Images

On 17 January my muscles became sore all over. I may have had a slight fever, but it wasn’t strong enough to notice. Looking back, it is a little scary, because my house and the language school where I study Japanese are within a 5km radius of the Wuhan seafood market (where the virus is believed to have originated).

To treat my muscle soreness, I took some cold tablets because I thought it was a normal cold. Now that I think of it, I might have missed the best time for treatment, failing to contain the virus with antiviral drugs in its early stages.

I have no idea how I got the virus. I always eat at the same Hong Kong-style

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