The Superseis are six dogs that are being trained to detect the new coronavirus. Norman, Digby, Storm, Star, Jasper and Asher are the components of this very special team consisting of three cocker spaniels, a labradoodle (mix of labrador and poodle), a mixed breed of labrador and golden retriever and a female labrador. Together they work at Medical Detection Dogs , a center that trains dogs to be able to detect the disease through their powerful smell , and which has just received financial support from the UK government to fight COVID-19.
Dogs will work with body odor samples , never with human tissue, such as that collected on used masks.
The goal of the project is for dogs to be able to reliably detect COVID-19 without the need for physical contact and in a large number of people, including those who are asymptomatic, and alert their handler. It would be a quick and non-invasive process that would also help the British national health system to test only suspected people for coronavirus, given the limited number of tests currently available.
The dogs would be deployed in crowded areas such as airports, public places and sporting events . After the first screening of the dog, the corresponding test would be done to verify if the person has the disease or not . They would also help assess the prevalence of the disease in travelers to specific locations , including current “hot spots.” An example of the latter would be to help establish that 50% of the passengers of a plane of destination A have the virus, while only 5% of the passengers of destination B have it, which would yield information on the risk and probability of rapid spread.
“All of our research to date has indicated that each disease we have worked on has a unique odor . There is some evidence from chemical analysis that viruses have a unique odor and there is existing research that shows that dogs can be trained to detect viruses in livestock. Therefore, there is very good reason to believe that COVID-19 has an odor that will be detectable, “they state in Medical Detection Dogs.
They continue: “It has been shown that dogs can accurately identify other conditions and infections in humans, such as fluctuating blood sugar levels in diabetic patients, some cancers, Parkinson’s disease and malaria. We do not know if COVID has a specific odor, but we believe it will, and if it does, we are confident that they will be able to detect COVID-19. “
This initiative is in addition to the one being carried out by the veterinary department of the University of Pennsylvania, which is training eight dogs to detect COVID-19.
The Superseis project has the financial support of the English government, but also public donations. The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine , which will be in charge of collecting samples, and the University of Durham also participate in it .
