Dogs Outperform Tests in Detecting COVID-19, Study Finds

A meta-analysis of over two-dozen studies conducted by scientists in California has shown that dogs' sense of smell can be a faster, more precise, and less expensive method for detecting COVID-19 than current technology. Dogs have up to 300 million olfactory receptors in their noses, compared to about six million in humans, and their ability to detect low concentrations of odors associated with COVID infections is about three orders of magnitude better than scientific instrumentation. Trained scent dogs have been found to be as effective, if not more effective, than antigen tests and the gold-standard RT-PCR tests, providing quick results in a non-intrusive manner. However, despite their success in detecting other conditions, challenges remain in integrating dogs into mainstream medical diagnoses.