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Asked by ǝǝɹ⊥ǝɥ⊥ to John on 13 Jan 2022.
Question: Why don't we use dogs for covid testing. Wouldn't it be more accurate than PCRs?
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John Tulloch answered on 13 Jan 2022:
It has been explored whether dogs can be used to detect COVID, they are not as accurate as PCR but better than lateral flow tests. The main issue with dogs is the number of dogs that would be needed to be used across the country and the time and expense it would take to train them all up. Dogs are already being used to detect a whole bunch of other diseases!
Comments
Samuel commented on :
I think the christmas lectures mentioned the idea of using them to screen crowds coming in to big events, which is a cool idea. But it takes quite a lot of time and money to train the dogs properly, so would never be practical for the millions of regular tests needed at the moment
Amy commented on :
It’s used as a plot point in World War Z, which is an interesting fictional take on pandemics as zombie outbreaks.