Study: Trained dogs able to sniff out Covid-19 with 94 per cent accuracy

After just a few days of training, detection dogs can sniff out coronavirus infections. This is according to a new study, published on July 23 and which was piloted by the University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, the Hannover Medical School and the German Armed Forces. The study established that if well-trained, dogs were able to discriminate between human saliva samples infected with SARS-Cov-2 and non-infected samples with a 94 per cent overall success rate.

“Within randomised and automated 1,012 sample presentations, dogs achieved an overall average detection rate of 94 per cent with 157 correct indications of positive, 792 correct rejections of negative, 33 incorrect indications of negative or incorrect rejections of 30 positive sample presentations,” the study read in part.