Anosmia Awareness Day

February 27, 2021

Today is World Anosmia Awareness Day. Until recently, anosmia was a term understood mainly by patients, physicians and researchers; however, this term has now become familiar to the general public because anosmia is one of the common symptoms of Covid-19, particularly of the mild form of the disease (Lechien et al. 2021). Anosmia involves not only loss of the ability to detect odors, but also loss of the ability to sense food aromas and perceive flavors; the sense of taste only allowing the detection of sweet, savory, sour, bitter and salty food. Loss of smell is very disturbing: it means loosing the everyday markers that are closely linked to odors and aromas. Although loss of smell is a short-term symptom for most Covid 19 patients, anosmia has been reported to persist for at least 6 months in patients with long Covid-19 (Lechien et al. 2021). Olfactory training is currently the only effective therapy for the treatment post-viral anosmia (French National Authority for Health, 2021), but oral corticosteroids may improve recovery of the sense of smell in Covid-19 patients (Le Bon et al. 2021; Vaira et al. 2020).