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Volume 29, Number 8—August 2023
Research Letter

Longitudinal Association of COVID-19 Hospitalization and Death with Online Search for Loss of Smell or Taste

Derek ToomreComments to Author , Sasikiran Kandula, and Jeffrey ShamanComments to Author 
Author affiliations: Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut, USA (D. Toomre); Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, New York, New York, USA (S. Kandula, J. Shaman); Columbia University School of Climate, New York (J. Shaman)

Main Article

Figure

Longitudinal association of COVID-19 hospitalization and death with online search for loss of smell or taste. A) Weekly COVID-19–associated deaths (per 100,000 population), hospitalizations (per 100,000 population), and Google search trends for ‘loss of smell’ and ‘loss of taste’ (per 10 million search sessions) in the United States during March 2020–September 2022. Vertical broken lines delimit calendar years. B) Cross-correlation between Google trends of the 2 search queries, and the 2 outcomes in 5 countries (columns) over the entire COVID-19 pandemic period of March 2020–September 2022 (top row) and disaggregated by calendar year. Statistically significant correlations (p<0.01) are indicated by a data point. Lag between paired search trend and outcome is shown in weeks.

Figure. Longitudinal association of COVID-19 hospitalization and death with online search for loss of smell or taste. A) Weekly COVID-19–associated deaths (per 100,000 population), hospitalizations (per 100,000 population), and Google search trends for ‘loss of smell’ and ‘loss of taste’ (per 10 million search sessions) in the United States during March 2020–September 2022. Vertical broken lines delimit calendar years. B) Cross-correlation between Google trends of the 2 search queries, and the 2 outcomes in 5 countries (columns) over the entire COVID-19 pandemic period of March 2020–September 2022 (top row) and disaggregated by calendar year. Statistically significant correlations (p<0.01) are indicated by a data point. Lag between paired search trend and outcome is shown in weeks.

Main Article

Page created: June 07, 2023
Page updated: July 20, 2023
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