Dogs And Disease Detection

Nosy Diagnoses

Dogs have such an acute sense of smell that they are able to detectdiseases like prostate cancer and diabetes.

Now scientists have discovered that man’s best friend can detect malaria infections through a person’s socks, the Guardian reported.

In research presented at the annual meeting of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene in New Orleans, scientists used two trained dogs to sniff for malaria on footwear samples from Gambian schoolchildren.

Lead researcher Steven Lindsay told the Guardian that some people infected with the disease don’t display any symptoms, but they emit a particular odor that canine snouts can detect.

“Individuals that are infected with malaria parasites produce odors in their breath and from their skin that are specific signals,” he said.

The research had promising results. The pooches accurately identified the socks of children with malaria infections about 70 percent of the time and correctly assessed uninfected ones about 90 percent of the time.

The canines struggled, however, in cases where the parasite had reached a reproductive stage giving rise to cells that would later develop into male and female sex cells.

Lindsay argued that the parasite could produce a different odor at this stage. He emphasized that more tests were needed to have dogs spot different strains of malaria – and in real people instead of footwear.