Dogs have nose for COVID-19, studies show. Why aren’t they used for testing?

Despite numerous studies showing not only their effectiveness but also their speed, dogs are not widely used for COVID-19 detection.

As the availability of COVID-19 tests dwindle across Canada, another option to detect the virus in the form of a furry friend may be the next best thing.

Multiple studies show that dogs can be more effective, faster and potentially less expensive than the current tests on the market.

The research has grown since 2020, with University of California Santa Barbara professor Tommy Dickey finding the collective research shows trained scent dogs are “as effective and often more effective” than both the rapid antigen tests many people keep in their homes, and even the PCR tests deployed at clinics and hospitals.

But even with studies showing their effectiveness, COVID-19-detecting dogs are deployed only in certain jurisdictions in various countries.

One such place is the Canines for Care program at Vancouver Coastal Health (VCH), which started looking into the possibility of training dogs to detect COVID-19 in early 2021.

Dr. Marthe Charles, division head of medical microbiology and infection prevention and control at VCH, said the idea stemmed from the early reliance on laboratory testing.

“I think there was a will from public health at the time and also from the various levels of government to try to find a way that was fast, accurate and non-invasive to be able to detect and train as many people as possible,” Charles told Global News in an interview.

Three dogs — two Labrador retrievers and an English springer spaniel — were brought in for training. The dogs were exposed to items such as masks that were worn by patients either negative or positive for the virus. This trained the dogs to recognize what is and is not COVID-19.