According to a study carried out at the University of Chicago, a weakened sense of smell may be a predictor of death. In the study, researchers tested the sense of smell of 3,000 people between the ages of 57 and 85. Participants had to identify five different smells: rose, peppermint, leather, orange, or fish in a multiple-choice test.

When the researchers checked back on the participants five years later they discovered something very surprising; nearly 40 percent of those who had received a low rating on the smell test had died. That figure was four times higher than the death rate for those with a healthy sense of smell. And only 19 percent of those with a moderate sense of smell had died in the same five-year period.

The researches stressed that the loss of the sense of smell is probably just an indicator of declining health–not a cause. On the other hand, they said that such smell tests could be a cheap and easy way to check the overall health of elderly people and even young people too.