Researchers from the University of Utah examined twitter posts from early April 2020, which contained either the words “COVID-19” or a similar synonym, as well as words referring to the three main symptoms recorded by the Centers for Disease Control at the time (fever, cough, shortness of breath). In doing so, they found references to 36 other unique symptoms, including 3 898 cases of the now well documented symptom of loss of taste. They suggest that “monitoring social media is a promising approach to public health surveillance”.
