Ratting them out: Rats are better at detecting tuberculosis in children than standard tests

( Natural News ) Tuberculosis ranks among the top ten causes of death around the world, mainly in low-income countries. One problem that makes it difficult to treat is the inability to detect it in the first place; the current methods used to find the disease leave a lot to be desired. Cheap smear tests are generally used in less-affluent countries in Southeast Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa, and they only turn up a positive result in those who have the disease 30 to 40 percent of the time. That could soon become a problem of the past, however, as scientists have discovered that rats have the uncanny ability to sniff out the disease among children. Tuberculosis killed 1.3 million people globally in 2016, including 130,000 children. Sick people smell different Researchers from Tanzania’s Sokoine University of Agriculture became interested in this possibility thanks to anecdotal reports that people with tuberculosis give off a very specific odor. For the study, which was published in Pediatric Research , the researchers trained African giant pouched rats to smell certain compounds that are produced by people with tuberculosis. They then presented the rodents with samples of mucus and saliva, or sputum, from nearly 1,000 children younger than five. While standard smear tests in Dar es Salaam clinics only picked up 34 cases among those aged 1 to 5, the rats found an additional 23 cases, which were later confirmed using advanced fluorescence techniques with a microscope. Among children aged 6 to 10, the smear test caught 94 cases, and the rats picked up 35 more cases. In adolescents, the smear test picked up 775 cases and the rats caught an additional 177, while in adults, the smear test found 7,448 cases and the rats picked up 2,510 more. Get more news like this […]

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