id	author	title	date	pages	extension	mime	words	sentences	flesch	summary	cache	txt
cord-282095-cbfyydi3	Pierron, Denis	Smell and taste changes are early indicators of the COVID-19 pandemic and political decision effectiveness	2020-10-14		.txt	text/plain	6441	289	51	Using data from a global, crowd-sourced study deployed in 30+ languages (Global Consortium for Chemosensory Research survey, GCCR, see "Methods" section), we tested whether changes in smell/taste at the population level could be used as an early indicator for local COVID-19 outbreaks. As pre-registered (see "Methods" section), our primary aim was to test the association between self-reported smell and taste changes and indicators of pressure in hospitals (COVID-related hospitalizations, CCRU admissions, and mortality rates) for each French administrative region over the last 3 months. The potential for self-reported smell and taste loss to serve as an early indicator of the number of COVID-19 cases-and hence hospital stress-was tested in a natural experiment by comparing France with Italy and the UK, which implemented lockdown with different timing and levels of stringency. Next, we examined the temporal dynamics in France of self-reported changes in smell/taste, the current governmental indicator (ratio of ER consults), and the number of CCRU admissions due to COVID-19 before and after the lockdown period.	./cache/cord-282095-cbfyydi3.txt	./txt/cord-282095-cbfyydi3.txt