Loss of smell was a symptom that was considered synonymous with COVID-19. Loss of smell for more than three years was the first red flag for a person to get tested for COVID-19. However, a recent BBC report suggests that air pollution, not Covid-19, is the latest evil affecting people’s sense of smell and it is here to stay!
Olfactory sensation will exist only in biology books and historical narratives as severe air pollution has now started affecting people’s ability to smell. Air pollution is slowly affecting the sense of smell, eliminating it over the years.
Air pollution is killing the ability to smell
exposure to PM2.5 – the collective name for small airborne pollution particles, mainly from fuel combustion in vehicles, power stations and our homes – previously associated with “olfactory dysfunction”.
However, this olfactory dysfunction has grown out of the industrial system and into people’s daily lives.
Researcher Murugappan Ramanathan Jr., a rhinologist at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore, has said, “Our data shows a 1.6 to 1.7-fold increase. [risk of] developing anosmia with continued particulate pollution,”
In one survey, researchers found that the increased number of patients with ‘anosmia’ was higher in neighborhoods that reported ‘significantly’ higher levels of PM 2.5.
PM2.5 is not the only devil
For example, a recent study in Brescia, northern Italy, found that adolescents and young adults with nosebleeds less sensitive to smell The more nitrogen dioxide – another pollutant produced when fossil fuels are burned, especially from vehicle engines – they are exposed to.
Another year-long study in São Paulo, Brazil, also indicated that people living in areas with high particulate pollution had an impaired sense of smell.
How does air pollution affect the sense of smell?
Ramanathan has indicated two possible routes.
One is that some of the pollution particles are passing through the olfactory bulb and going directly to the brain, causing inflammation. BBC Report. ,olfactory nerve are in the brain but they have small holes at the base of the skull where small fibers go into the nose, [looking] “Almost like little pieces of angel hair pasta,” says Ramanathan. “They’re exposed.”
The other possible mechanism, Ramanathan says, is to kill the olfactory bulb on an almost daily basis, which directly causes inflammation and damage to the nerves, slowly chipping them away.
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