Cellphone of Death at 1:28 PM

I have come to the conclusion that the telephone is making my roommate sick. He seems fine one moment, but as soon as the phone rings all hell breaks loose. His voice lowers and sounds weaker, and he can't seem to breath without coughing up a lung as he tells his mom in a meek whisper of a voice, "yea I feel a little better". It seems to me that the simple answer to his illness would be not to answer the phone. Really it's like night and day. The phone comes on and he's all "goodbye cruel world, I caught whooping cough". I know I should be a good roommate and deal with his time of pain and illness with compassion but when it becomes this apparent I really have very little patients and sympathy.