Studies say Sniffer DOGS is better at discovering Covid than actual testing

According to the strongest evidence to date, detection dogs are better at finding Covid than testing.

Throughout the pandemic, scientists say they can use the dog’s sharp sense of smell to detect people who carry the virus.

However, the promising lab results of the dog being exposed to the sample in a highly controlled situation needed to be reproduced under real-world conditions.

New results from the University of Helsinki show that Labrador retrievers and White Shepherds can detect up to 97% of positive cases.

Studies also claim that trained dogs are 99% accurate in determining who is infected with the virus among airport passengers.

For comparison, studies show that immunochromatography detects up to 72% of cases.

Finnish researchers said the use of dogs at airports and other mass gatherings could be a “valuable tool to contain a pandemic.”

Researchers at the University of Helsinki trained four dogs (Labrador retrievers Silja, Lele, Costi and a white shepherd called ET (taken at Helsinki-Vantaa International Airport)) to sniff out Covid in the spring of 2020. ..

The results show that dogs can detect up to 97 percent of positive cases. Studies also claim that trained dogs are 99% accurate in determining who is infected with the virus among airport passengers.Photo: Costa at Helsinki-Vantaa International Airport

New results from a study at the University of Helsinki show that dogs can find up to 97% of cases and are 99% accurate when ascertaining who is not infected with the virus. Photo: The White Shepherd ET in the test room shows the sample in the middle. The second sample is Covid positive by placing one foot.

Researchers say their findings suggest that dogs that can sniff out malaria Parkinson’s disease and cancer can serve as a virus screening method when testing is not available, such as in the early stages of a pandemic. rice field. Photo: A dedicated puppy at Helsinki-Vantaa International Airport in Finland. The dog sniffed the sample from the passenger.

Dogs have never been used for a British pandemic. However, as part of a test they were able to see being carried out at the airport, they were deployed at Paddington Station in London.

Detection dogs have already been used to warn of epileptic seizures, cancer and Parkinson’s disease.

Dogs can pick up scents at a trillionth level. This is equivalent to a teaspoon of sugar in two Olympic-sized pools.

It is believed that it can detect compounds that are quietly released when the body is ill.

In the spring of 2020, the Helsinki team trained four dogs (Labrador retrievers Silja, Lele, Costi and a white shepherd called ET) to sniff out Covid.

Dogs were exposed to skin samples (cotton swabs from the neck, forehead, and wrists) of 114 volunteers who tested positive for the virus.

They were also exposed to hundreds of Covid-free samples.

During training, dogs were 92% accurate in detecting infected individuals and 91% accurate in confirming that someone was Covid negative.

The dog showed a positive case by providing or sitting on its front legs.

Also, even when samples were obtained from asymptomatic individuals, their sniffing skills were about the same (89%).

For comparison, studies show that immunochromatography misses 20-80 percent of positive cases.

To test dogs in real-world scenarios, they sniffed 303 arriving passengers at Helsinki-Vantaa International Airport in Finland between September 2020 and April 2021.

Each passenger also had a PCR test.

Result is, BMJ Global HealthIndicates that dog detection and PCR results were in agreement at 98% of the time.

An early study by British researchers at Durham University and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine found that dogs could detect up to 94% of cases, much more accurate than rapid immunochromatography.

British researchers said the two dogs could screen 300 passengers coming off the plane for Covid in just 30 minutes.Photo: Medical Detection Dogs and Handlers show how dogs can be used to detect Covids in the general public in public places.

Dogs have never been used for a British pandemic. However, the dog was deployed at London’s Paddington Station as part of a test to determine if the dog could effectively sniff out the disease using £ 500,000 taxpayer cash (Duke of Cornwall). I took a picture with my wife and former Health Minister Matt Hancock)

Dogs sniffing a dedicated cubicle sample at the airport confirmed that 296 of the 300 passengers were Covid-negative (99% success rate).

However, they could not find only three passengers who were PCR positive.

However, the researchers said one of these passengers was negative on the second PCR and one was positive, but no longer infectious.

According to experts, some of the dog’s sniffing skill discrepancies are due to being trained to detect the original strain of virus rather than alpha.

Due to the low positive rate at the airport, dogs were given 155 samples from Covid-infected individuals. The dog correctly identified 99% of these swabs.

Combining the airport with a positive sample test, dogs found 97% of infected dogs and 99% of virus-free dogs.

Researchers have stated that this demonstrates the “strong discriminating power” of dog sniffing skills and needs to be trained to detect all circulating mutations.

They said dogs could be retrained to detect new strains in just “a few hours.”

Another analysis models how accurate a dog can sniff out a virus if 4 out of 10 people are infected, such as in a hospital during a pandemic, or if only 1% is infected, such as at an airport. Did.

At high prevalence, they estimated that dogs sport 88% of positive cases and 94.5% of negative cases.

When the prevalence of the virus is low, dogs find 1 in 10 infected and confirm almost all negative cases.

The results suggest that dogs can be used for screening to eliminate people who do not need PCR swabs to save both time and testing ability, the researchers said.