I took the test. It came back negative COVID, positive RSV. I've been stuck with the same cough since then. A chest x-ray revealed damage to my lungs from RSV, which like any RSV, will recover eventually (probably after several months due to my age). So no, I'm not just assuming allergies. I know what's going on. If I were working as a waiter, that means you think I couldn't work, despite that I am double vaxxed and have had COVID. The government doesn't offer disability for just a cough. For my kid, that would mean missing an entire year of preschool back then. That's absurd.
It's been apparently to many of us that the main thing going on with you is hypochondria...which is why you think that people should never go out with coughs and that they should be masked in perpetuity.
When there is a known deadly disease traveling around, it's a bit of a stretch to call precautions against that disease "hypochondria".