SARS-CoV-2, the virus causing Covid-19, can infect sensory neurons explaining why many people reported losing their senses of smell and taste, finds a study. When Covid-19 began spreading in 2020, some of its most common symptoms affected the peripheral nervous system, the network of nerves that enables communication between the brain and the rest of the body.

Human senses of smell and taste both rely on sensory neurons in the peripheral nervous system. Early evidence had suggested that the virus could not infect neurons or only infected them rarely. A team from Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research in the US, however, has found that SARS-CoV-2 can infect sensory neurons, leading to changes in the cells` gene expression.