New evidence confirms that dogs can detect COVID-19 with their noses.
A study published in the journal Plos One shows how trained detection dogs can be used as a form of “rapid testing” for the virus.
Dogs in the study sniffed out swabs of sweat and swabs of saliva.
Trained canines were 97% accurate in detecting whether COVID-19 was present.
Even in cases where patients were asymptomatic, the dogs were about 94% accurate in detecting the virus.
According to the results of the study, the trained dogs were better at detecting COVID-19 than antigen tests.
Researchers concluded that trained dogs could be used as a non-invasive way to test for coronavirus, especially when conducting mass screenings where results are needed quickly.
