Loss of smell and taste could be first sign for virus victims

A LOSS of smell and taste senses could be symptoms of the new coronavirus, according to a leading ear, nose and throat specialist.

Professor Nirmal Kumar, president of ENT UK, a body representing ear, nose and throat surgeons, said Covid-19 patients are presenting with the symptoms, even when they do not have the more common conditions of fever and cough. He advised that people in the UK should self-isolate if they experience these new symptoms.

“In young patients, they do not have any significant symptoms such as the cough and fever, but they may have just the loss of sense of smell and taste, which suggests that these viruses are lodging in the nose,” he told Sky News.

ENT UK released a statement, cosigned by Professor Claire Hopkins, president of the British Rhinological Society, saying that isolating people with a loss of smell but no other symptoms for seven days could reduce the number of people who are infecting others with the virus, without realising it. The statement said: “There is already good evidence from South Korea, China and Italy that significant numbers of patients with proven Covid-19 infection have developed anosmia/hyposmia (loss of sense of smell). There have been a rapidly growing number of reports of a significant increase in the number of patients presenting with anosmia in the absence of other symptoms – this has been widely shared on medical discussion boards by surgeons managing a high incidence of cases.”

The Department of Health and Social Care said that people should not selfisolate unless they have a fever or a new continuous cough.

Stephen Powis, National Medical Director of NHS England, said: “The two most common symptoms by far are cough and fever, and that is exactly why we are asking people to self-isolate based on those symptoms.”

‘Young patients may have the loss of sense of smell and taste, which suggests viruses are lodging in the nose’