Question

Give reason why we lose the taste of food during severe cough and cold?

Answer 1

The sense of smell and the sense of taste are correlated. Anosmia is a scientific term that is used to depict loss of sense of smell. Loss of smell can be minor or major as well as short-term or long-term. Smoking or exposure to pollutants can severely affect the mucous membranes of the nose and can affect the ability to perceive smells.

Complete answer:
- Taste does not come from the tongue, it is from the brain. Out of the four lobes that the brain has, the parietal lobe is mainly responsible for things such as taste, temperature, movement and touch.
- Majorly 80% of our taste is related to the smell.
- When we have a severe cough and mainly cold, the mucus blocks the nostrils of our nose due to swelling which causes inflammation and that affects our ability to breathe in a proper way. The recognition of smelling of food and the taste buds, helps the brain detect taste. Hence, the food tasting ability gets hampered.

Note: Taste buds are the true taste organs. They are inside the epithelium of the tongue and coordinates with the outside environment by the means of a taste pore. Taste buds are the sensory organs that make one experience different types of tastes like sweet, sour, salty and bitter. Human tongue has approximately 2000-8000 taste buds so there would be many receptor cells. Taste buds are not visible to the naked eye. The bumps that you see on the tongue are called papillae. They are very important because they have helped in our evolution.