London, May 24 (beraking latest news Health / Xinhua) – Sniffer dogs to be unleashed at airports and at major events, to ‘smell’ Covid-positive people and contain the spread of the pandemic coronavirus. A group of British scientists led by James Logan of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, authors of a study described on the BBC, is working on it. According to Logan, the ‘sniff-test’ could become “a suitable method for mass screening”, perhaps to be combined with traditional diagnostic techniques to intercept more than 9 cases of Covid-19 out of 10.
The dogs protagonists of the trial, conducted in collaboration with the University of Durham, were taught to recognize a particular smell produced by people infected with Sars-CoV-2 and not detectable by the human nose. Claire Guest, scientific director of the British charity Medical Detection Dogs, which trained the animals, explains that the research results represent “further proof” that dogs are “one of the most reliable biosensors for detecting the smell of human diseases. “. The study showed that Covid-sniffing dogs were able to identify 88% of the positives to the new coronavirus: this means that, for every 100 infected, only 12 animals missed it. On the contrary, out of 100 people without Covid, dogs were wrong in 14 cases, mistakenly considering them positive.
Scientists believe these animals could be used as an “additional screening tool alongside more conventional tests,” pointing out that sniffing using dogs, followed by swabs, could flush out 91% of infections. The real potential advantage is speed, the researchers point out. In fact, 2 dogs would be enough to control 300 people in half an hour.
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