For those who fear getting caught in long waiting lines or having to endure uncomfortable nasal swabs to get tested for COVID-19, dogs could be a beacon of hope.
Growing evidence shows that canines could be used to detect coronavirus at ports of entry, as well as sniff out bombs, drugs or other diseases. This would potentially reduce long waits in test lines and strengthen efforts to contain transmission quickly, cheaply, and non-invasively.
Two dogs could accurately scan 300 passengers in about half an hour as part of a rapid detection strategy, according to research from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. That would mean that only people selected by the dogs would have to undergo a PCR test.
“Current COVID testing methods are not suitable for the rapid detection of large numbers of people, such as in airports or other public places where many people have to be tested very quickly,” said James Logan, head of the department of disease control from the London School of Hygiene, in a May briefing.
The dogs were able to detect both asymptomatic patients and people with two different strains and some with low viral load. The canine screening strategy followed by a PCR test would detect 91 percent of cases, the scientists said.
Another French study showed that the detection of dogs reached 97 percent sensitivity, which means that that’s how well canines could identify positive samples. Sniffing was also 91 percent specific, which rates the dogs’ ability to identify negatives. The sensitivity index exceeds that of many 15-minute antigen tests, which tend to be better at ruling out an infection than at finding it. And last year, German researchers said the trained canines were able to distinguish between saliva samples from people infected with the virus and those who were not infected more than 90 percent of the time.
While Finland, Dubai and Switzerland have started training dogs to sniff out infections, the method has yet to be more widely deployed. The UK study researchers said they believe the results could be replicated in real-world settings, paving the way for a smoother and more cuddly mass scan.
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