Cutaneous evidence of early coronavirus infection in the UK?

On 26th January this year I started to experience a cough, a slight temperature, peculiar headaches, wheezing and shortage of breath, and a sensation that my breath smelled of petrol. Because coronavirus wasn’t supposedly at large in this country at that time (although isolated cases had begun to be announced, three days earlier) I never even thought that it might be the cause of my symptoms. I had not been abroad since the previous September, and then only to European countries not initially associated with coronavirus. It wasn’t a cold, and my flu inoculations were up to date.

A week later, at 4 a.m. on 3rd February, unable to sleep and while still feeling unwell, I switched on the light and noticed a peculiar red patch on my right hand, below the base of the thumb. It was angry looking, with a sharply defined but irregular edge, about the size of a postage stamp; it wasn’t painful or itchy. During the day the colour faded to pink before disappearing entirely, but emerging in the middle of it was what looked like a friction blister, which felt slightly sore if I pressed on it. This photo was taken during the evening.

 

I’ve never experienced anything like it before, although I’ve had plenty of viral infections over the years, and suggestions that it could be a burn or a bite aren’t really credible. Curiously, it’s the one area of skin where occasionally, if I’ve eaten very sugary cakes or biscuits, I get transient hives or itchy spots. A few days later I accidentally knocked the blister, which burst, releasing watery fluid, and beneath it the flesh looked raw and weepy - as with conventional blisters. I put a plaster on it and it took several weeks to heal, leaving a slight indentation and dark red scarring, which is now – 3 months on - starting to fade. It remained a mystery; “one of those things”.

Only at the end of last week did I see press reports, commenting on studies in various parts of the world, suggesting that peculiar cutaneous reactions to Covid-19 are frequent, and have been tentatively grouped into five types. Only then did I realise a possible cause of my strange skin lesion back in early February. 

Many anecdotal accounts online report what sounds very much like coronavirus infection in the UK long before the first officially confirmed cases. If these cases – and my own - were not coronavirus, what were they? If they were – as may be established eventually by antibody testing - what would that imply for the “official” narrative and chronology?