According to the internet, and now some doctors, it appears that the Yankee Candle in your living room may be a good alternative to those expired Covid tests. 

What originally started as a joke on Twitter is now a potential warning sign of an impending Covid wave, according to at least one doctor. 

In a viral tweet posted Sunday, Dr. Jorge Caballero, San Francisco Bay-based anesthesiologist who tracks Coronavirus trends on Twitter, posted screenshots of one-star Amazon reviews for Yankee scented candles, adding “Yankee Candle reviews indicate COVID is about to surge again.”

If it’s not immediately obvious, Caballero’s implied connection between the two is that loss of smell is one of the most distinctive symptoms of Covid. Meaning that reviewers may already be sick and not know it.

While it’s certainly more than plausible that Yankee Candle just rolled out an under-scented batch or two, a July article from Northeastern University actually suggests that months of Yankee candle and perfume reviews on Amazon seem to have potentially given a slight heads up of impending national case increases during the Omicron wave.

We don’t need to tell you that internet memes are probably the very last place you should be getting your medical advice from. But with the CDC shifting towards a “You guys got this. Good luck!” approach and some experts anticipating a winter Covid wave, double checking the reviews on that Autumn Harvest candle couldn’t hurt.