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CLEVELAND (WJW) – A popular health study is showing one symptom is becoming more commonly reported by people with COVID-19.

When the coronavirus pandemic began three years ago, its symptoms were well known: a dry cough, sore throat, fever, runny nose, loss of taste and smell.

Now a rising number of people are reporting muscle aches and pains as a common symptom according to a recent health survey on ZOE.

“Myalgia is actually a pretty common symptom in anybody that is having a febrile illness,” University Hospital Pediatric Infectious Disease Specialist Dr. Amy Edwards said. “Anybody that has an illness that causes them to have a fever, muscle pain is a very common complication of fever.”

Muscle aches and pains are being reported in 36 percent of COVID patients according to a report published with the National Library of Medicine, but Edwards said there is no real cause for concern.

“It’s been pretty consistent, there hasn’t been another big shift in dominant symptomatology since Omicron took hold last year,” she said.

The Department of Public Health for the City of Cleveland adds that COVID is becoming less and less of a concern.

“We haven’t had a surge in hospitalizations the way we did the last couple of winters,” Director Dave Margolius said. “The big difference has been the vaccination rate has just been a game changer.”

Margolius said 57.4 percent of Cleveland residents have received at least one dose of the vaccine and nearly 26 percent have received a booster.

“The herd immunity definition is always kind of overly technical, but I would say because of our vaccination rate because people who’ve been vaccinated have also had COVID, people have really strong immunity at this point,” he said. “COVID is not the threat that it once was.”