Testing sites for COVID-19 have closed across the United States.Congress slashed funding to keep track of cases across the country. At home tests are being used but those results are seldom reported to health agencies. That means that any case counts are just the tip of the iceberg.
This gave birth to the Yankee Candle theory of tracking COVID cases. It was discovered that whenever there was an influx of negative reviews citing no smell, there was usually a spike in COVID cases to go along with it. Losing your sense of smell is one of the many symptoms of an infection.
Nick Beauchamp an associate professor of political science at Northeastern University, decided to do a more detailed study to test the finding. He created a model to test the results. To his surprise, the relationship was clear; COVID cases followed a very similar pattern to the frequency of the reviews. By mid-January 2022, he had written a paper and submitted it to a journal, and by June 2022 it had been published.
Tthe results from the paper showed that COVID when there was a recorded surge in COVID cases, there would likely be an increase in the negative reviews. A negative reviews might actually be an earlier warning sign than the official COVID data. The reviews offer “digital breadcrumbs,” of the rising cases to come.