I haven't posted in a while, but this study on how and why COVID causes loss of smell, called anosmia, caught my eye. Apparently, hamsters are really fond of Cocoa Krispies. Researchers took advantage of this to see how long it would take hamsters infected with COVID to find the treats in their bedding. Turns out, hamsters who weren't sick and hamsters with the flu could find them within seconds, but hamsters with COVID didn't even bother to look. Couldn't smell them. COVID clogs their little sniffer systems with gunk due to inflammation, causing confusion in the nose nerves. The nerves aren't damaged but temporarily too busy to pick up scents. The same process is thought to happen in humans. Cocoa Krispies aren't my thing, but it was a bummer to not be able to smell my morning coffee when I had COVID. If you want to read a more scientific explanation of all this, here is the link to the article in Scientific American: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/covid-smell-loss-and-long-covid-linked-to-inflammation1/
