Home   >   News   >   Covid-19 sniff test results prove we can count on dogs.

Covid-19 sniff test results prove we can count on dogs.

By on June 9, 2020

Finding ways and means to quickly identify who might have been exposed to the virus, a key strategy for preventing the further spread of COVID-19, is turning out to be more complicated than everyone initially thought. Even with a coalition of countries, scientists, health experts, the methods available are clearly time consuming and challenging. Even tech giants that have jumped right in are experiencing glitches affecting data accuracy with contact tracing apps.

Where can the world get help from? According to French scientists, that could well be from man’s best friend.

Nosaïs Covid-19, a series of tests given to detection dogs to identify people who contract Covid-19, had started in France and Lebanon. Eight Belgian shepherd dogs (explosive detection dogs and colon cancer detection dogs) performed a total of 368 sniff test trials with ten other breeds. The tests given by researchers from the National Veterinary School in Alfort involve sniffing sweat samples taken from the armpits of more than 198 patients provided by different hospitals. The samples were a mix of those who have and have not contracted Covid-19.

The results published on Biorxic.org, a preprint website on Biology, suggests the dogs’ accuracy rate varied from 83 to 94 per cent with 4 dogs achieving a perfect score. Lead researcher Dominique Grandjean says, “We conclude that there is a strong evidence dogs can detect a person infected by the SARS-CoV-2 virus responsible for Covid-19 disease.”  Grandjean is also Head of the equine and carnivores clinical sciences department and canine breeding and sport medicine unit at the National Veterinary School of Alfort.

In April, sniff trials were held simultaneously in France and Lebanon using a canine brigade handpicked from the emergency services in Paris and Corsica, and from a dog training center in Beirut. French-Lebanese Surgical Oncologist at the Hôtel-Dieu de France and Paris’s Saint-Antoine hospital Riad Sarkis is the team’s project leader. He and Grandjean set up together the experimental protocol for coronavirus detection dogs.

The research team chose to use armpit sweat samples because they contained a strong chemical that sends out a signal for potential pathogens in the body without having to deal with virus strains that could put the animals’ safety at risk. “We’ve looked at urine, feces, tears and saliva of positive COVID-19 patients, but all of them excrete virus,” explains Grandjean. Sarkis adds, “Covid-19 positive patients emit a distinctive body odor that only dogs can spot with their highly developed receptors.”

Although the study may be small in scale, Grandjean feeling hopeful says, “The research proves that detection dogs can help us in our work for Covid-19. More dogs are now being trained to sniff out the virus to enable larger scale experiments.”

About Ted Tanaka