Unleashing canine detectives: Dogs outperform tech in COVID-19 detection!
Over the past couple of years, a remarkable consensus has emerged within the scientific community: dogs have the potential to be not only faster and more accurate but also less expensive tools for detecting COVID-19 compared to our current advanced technology. With a growing body of evidence, it's becoming increasingly evident that dogs possess a unique capability to identify the elusive virus and its variants, even when they're hidden among other viruses such as those causing the common cold or flu.
UC Santa Barbara Distinguished Professor Emeritus Tommy Dickey and collaborator Heather Junqueira from BioScent, Inc. have spearheaded an impressive review that consolidates the outcomes of a multitude of studies. This comprehensive review, published in the Journal of Osteopathic Medicine, draws attention to the extraordinary potential of trained scent dogs in the context of COVID-19 detection.
Through an exhaustive examination of peer-reviewed studies, both from field and clinical experiments, Dickey and Junqueira contend that dogs trained to identify scents are not just "as effective and often more effective" than the at-home antigen tests and clinic-standard reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) tests; they also come with added advantages. Dogs can swiftly and non-intrusively detect the SARS-CoV-2 virus, without the environmental toll associated with single-use plastics.
The Unique Power of Dogs Dogs' incredible olfactory prowess lies at the heart of their ability. Possessing hundreds of millions of olfactory receptors—compared to humans' five to six million—and with a third of their brains dedicated to interpreting scents, dogs can detect extremely low concentrations of odor molecules linked to COVID-19 infections.
Tommy Dickey explains, "They can detect the equivalent of one drop of an odorous substance in 10.5 Olympic-sized swimming pools. For perspective, this is about three orders of magnitude better than with scientific instrumentation." Notably, dogs have even managed to identify COVID-19 in individuals who were pre-symptomatic or asymptomatic, and their viral load was too low for conventional tests to pick up. Additionally, dogs are adept at distinguishing COVID-19 and its variants even in the presence of other potentially confusing respiratory viruses like those causing the common cold or flu.
Exceeding Standards Dickey notes, "They're much more effective. In fact, one of the authors that we quote in the paper commented that the RT-PCR test is not the gold standard anymore. It's the dog." With astounding quickness, dogs can deliver a verdict on whether an individual is carrying the virus within seconds, solely by smelling them.
In practice, the dog may perform a quick sniff test by sitting down to indicate the presence of COVID-19. Alternatively, the dog could be presented with a sample of sweat to smell, which might take a few minutes. This swift response is particularly crucial during phases of pandemics where a delayed test result could lead to a surge in infections or in scenarios involving a large number of people.
While certain breeds like beagles, basset hounds, and coonhounds, known for their reliance on their sense of smell, are ideal for this task, various other breeds have demonstrated their capabilities. Puppies, older dogs, males, females, purebreds, and mixed breeds all performed remarkably well after a few weeks of training. Intriguingly, even a "problem" pit bull terrier that had suffered abuse proved to be an adept COVID-19 detector.
Moving Forward Despite the impressive success stories, there are still challenges to integrating dogs into mainstream medical diagnosis, although they have exhibited success in detecting various other conditions, such as diabetes and cancer. Dickey acknowledges, "There's quite a bit of research, but it's still considered by many as a kind of a curiosity."
Countries like Finland and Colombia have been more open to conducting field experiments with dogs due to their desire for cost-effective and rapid COVID-19 detection methods that don't rely on waiting for expensive tests or reagents to become available.
As Dickey and Junqueira conclude, "After conducting this comprehensive review, we believe that scent dogs deserve their place as a serious diagnostic methodology that could be particularly useful during future pandemics, potentially as part of rapid routine health screenings in public spaces. Perhaps, most importantly, we argue that the impressive international quality and quantity of COVID scent dog research described in our paper for the first time, demonstrates that medical scent dogs are finally ready for a host of mainstream medical applications."