Describing the common cold or flu in Spanish

Question

In English, when talking about common viruses people get, there are generally two categories:

a cold is generally mild and can come with runny nose, sneezing, coughing, sore throat etc.
a flu is generally more severe and can bring fever, chills, fatigue etc.

In my experience, in Spanish both of these tend to be wrapped up in one word: gripe.

What are the official and informal ways of referring to these diseases? What regional variants exists?

Even in English, I can't remember the last time an Australian complained of having a more cold! (-: — hippietrail, Dec 30 '16 at 17:09

Sergio Romero · Accepted Answer · 2012-07-03T20:38:44.600

11

At least in Mexico which is where I come from:

As you say gripe or gripa are used to refer to both the common cold and the flu. This is the colloquial way of saying it.

It would be more correct to refer to the common cold as

resfriado / catarro

and to the flu as

gripe / gripa / influenza

but it is not that common, like I said, where I come from.

edited Jul 03 '12 at 20:38

answered Jul 03 '12 at 18:50

Sergio Romero

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In Spain, to have a cold is "tener catarro" or "estar constipado" (not to be confused with "constipated", which in Spain is "estreñido"), "resfriado" is more "formal". Flu is just "gripe", not gripa nor influenza. So, in Spain we make the difference between cold and flu. – JoulSauron Jul 03 '12 at 20:14

score 5 · Answer 2 · edited Dec 29 '15 at 18:47

5

Here in Chile, we say:

Resfrío (common) or Resfriado (less common): cold
Gripe (common) or Influenza (less common, because gripe and influenza are actually different): flu

edited Dec 29 '15 at 18:47

Nicolás Ozimica

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answered Jun 11 '14 at 21:03

Eva Thyssen

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score 4 · Answer 3 · answered Dec 29 '15 at 18:47

4

In Dominican Republic, we differentiate between having a cold (tener catarro) and the flu (gripe). Influenza is use more in reference to a pandemic type of flu.

answered Dec 29 '15 at 18:47

Estela

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score 3 · Answer 4 · answered Jun 11 '14 at 21:42

Well... I'm from Mexico but where I come frome we just say "gripa" for cold and "gripa" for flu [haha] but we say that it was a very bad "gripa" or "gripa de perro" (dog's flu) very commonly used. There are other words but those are used in the TV or other countries.

score 2 · Answer 5 · edited Jun 17 '20 at 09:53

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Cold

catarro, constipado, romadizo, coriza, pasmo, fluxión, decenso⁰
enfriamiento, resfriamiento, resfriado, resfrío, resfrío común

Flu

gripe, gripa,¹ gripola⁴
influenza, resfriado, trancazo,² monga³

^{0. Desusado}
^{1. México, Paraguay, Colombia, Ecuador}
^{2. Coloq.}
^{3. Puerto Rico}
^{4. El Salvador}

edited Jun 17 '20 at 09:53

Community

1

answered Jun 28 '18 at 19:53

jacobo

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score 1 · Answer 6 · 2017-01-29T20:49:28.337

1

Trancazo is another term for "gripe"

2. m. coloq. gripe.

and it is often used (informally) in Spain ("¡Tengo un trancazo!").

edited Jan 29 '17 at 20:49

answered Nov 20 '16 at 19:33

Describing the common cold or flu in Spanish

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