A 44‑year‑old medical researcher from Litchfield, Staffordshire, lost taste and smell after catching Covid in August 2022. He joined a home‑based trial that sent him specially formulated chewing gum to chew twice daily for 12 weeks. The gum carried intense flavors—spicy, minty, sour, sweet—designed to retrain neural pathways for participants.

The University of Nottingham, led by Dr Nicole Yang, recruited 16 participants. They chewed the gum in the morning and evening, allowing the flavor to change as they chewed. The design aimed to stimulate brain areas linked to olfaction and gustation, hoping to restore the lost senses for recovery in.

Six weeks in, the participant reported tasting blueberry for the first time in years. By trial’s end, 83% noted taste improvement and 67% saw smell return. The participant, now able to detect coffee beans, shaving cream, and children’s hair, described the experience as a return to normalcy of daily life.

This decentralized approach shows that simple, flavor‑rich gum can cue the brain to relearn sensory input without clinical visits. The University of Nottingham team now seeks funding for a larger study, aiming to make this low‑cost intervention available to the millions still battling post‑Covid anosmia and ageusia worldwide communities.