Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Guy's and St Thomas' University Hospital, London, UK.
Int Forum Allergy Rhinol. 2020 Jul;10(7):839-847. doi: 10.1002/alr.22580. Epub 2020 Jun 15.
Initial reports describing coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) were dominated by the presence of cough, breathlessness, and fever; anecdotal reports suggested anosmia may also be a manifestation. We used Google Trends (GT) to investigate whether there was a surge in individuals searching for information related to smell loss during the COVID-19 epidemic in Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom, the United States, Germany, France, Iran, and The Netherlands.
GT was used to explore internet activity related to loss of smell in the 8 aforementioned countries. Spearman rank analysis was performed to correlate loss-of-smell-relative search volumes (RSVs), with the increases of daily confirmed cases of COVID-19 and deaths attributed to disease. As a control event, we also performed analysis of smell-related searches during the last UK influenza epidemic of 2009.
In all 8 countries, we observed strong correlations between daily RSVs related to loss of smell, increases of daily COVID-19 cases and deaths ranging from 0.633 to 0.952. All correlations were statistically significant (p < 0.05).
There is a strong correlation between the frequency of searches for smell-related information and the onset of COVID-19 infection in Italy, Spain, UK, USA, Germany, France, Iran, and The Netherlands. We hypothesize this may relate to a previously underrecognized symptom.
最初描述 2019 年冠状病毒（COVID-19）的报告主要集中在咳嗽、呼吸困难和发热上；传闻报告表明嗅觉丧失也可能是一种表现。我们使用谷歌趋势（GT）来调查在意大利、西班牙、英国、美国、德国、法国、伊朗和荷兰的 COVID-19 疫情期间，是否有更多的人在互联网上搜索与嗅觉丧失相关的信息。
GT 用于探索上述 8 个国家与嗅觉丧失相关的互联网活动。采用 Spearman 秩相关分析来关联嗅觉丧失相关搜索量（RSV）与每日 COVID-19 确诊病例数和归因于该疾病的死亡人数的增加之间的关系。作为对照事件，我们还分析了 2009 年英国流感大流行期间与嗅觉相关的搜索。
在所有 8 个国家中，我们观察到与嗅觉丧失相关的每日 RSV 与每日 COVID-19 病例数和死亡人数的增加之间存在很强的相关性，范围从 0.633 到 0.952。所有相关性均具有统计学意义（p < 0.05）。
在意大利、西班牙、英国、美国、德国、法国、伊朗和荷兰，与嗅觉相关的信息搜索频率与 COVID-19 感染的发生之间存在很强的相关性。我们假设这可能与以前未被认识到的症状有关。
