acute odynophagia, a new symptom linked to Omicron

In January, Gwendoline Placier, 41, was infected with Covid-19. She had neither high fever nor chills, but a sore throat. “The first feeling was when I was eating my evening meal, I started to feel. I had the irritations, and over time it started to get worse. When swallowing the food, it’s there that I felt the embarrassment”she says.

Diagnosis: odynophagia, which reaches the pharynx and affects swallowing. The Omicron variant attacks this part of the throat. Corticosteroids were prescribed to Gwendoline Placier, as well as instructions for feeding. “We will eventually recommend having a tender soft food, or else well coated, that is to say well in sauce, to reduce irritation when passing through the esophagus”, explains Joanna Soares, dietician at Nutrisens. Odynophagia is still unknown. Studies show that it can also be treated with probiotics.