Out of the 36 million Americans who contracted COVID-19 in 2021, an estimated 800,000 didn’t regain their sense of smell, and 540,000 didn’t regain their sense of taste after recovering from the infection, according to a recent study published in The Laryngoscope.
The study’s data further suggest that many more people experienced only partial recovery in their taste or smell post-infection—5.2 million and 4.2 million, respectively.
