[HN Gopher] Why aren't there more dogs at the doctor's office?
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Why aren't there more dogs at the doctor's office?
Author : Ariarule
Score : 31 points
Date : 2022-03-19 16:11 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (daily.jstor.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (daily.jstor.org)
| ogwh wrote:
| Allergies.
| jjcon wrote:
| Answer: Dogs kill 25 thousand people a year - they are not safe
| and people are allergic.
|
| Edit: It isn't rabies that makes them unsafe - just in the USA
| about 4.5 million Americans are attacked by dogs every year
| resulting in thousands of hospitalizations.
|
| https://www.wemjournal.org/article/S1080-6032(09)70079-1/ful...
| Animats wrote:
| > Dogs kill 25 thousand people a year
|
| Huh? The cited article gives US statistics. "During this
| 27-year time period there were 504 deaths reported. An average
| of 18.67 deaths occurred per year, with a range of 11 to 33
| deaths." That's about the same as US deaths from lightning
| strikes.[1]
|
| [1] https://www.weather.gov/safety/lightning-fatalities19
| jjcon wrote:
| That is worldwide - I added US attack statistics as part of
| my edit to point out that something can be dangerous without
| causing death. Here you can read about the 25k deaths:
| https://www.bbc.com/news/world-36320744
| Etheryte wrote:
| This is highly misleading without context. Humans kill roughly
| 475,000 humans every year [0]. Should we avoid having humans at
| the doctor's office?
|
| [0] https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/the-animals-that-kill-
| mo...
| tick_tock_tick wrote:
| What kind of take is this? You need to interact with
| humans.....
| jjcon wrote:
| So if something kills less than 475k people we should
| consider it safe? What kind of reasoning is that?
| petee wrote:
| I think thats a fantastic idea +1
| themgt wrote:
| Well, the chance that your doctor would intentionally murder
| you is likely higher than the chance your doctor would be
| using a rabid feral dog from a 3rd world country, which are
| responsible for nearly all of the "kill 25 thousand people a
| year" you cited.
| jjcon wrote:
| And the 4.5 million annual attacks in the USA alone?
| patall wrote:
| What is so misleading about that number? That's 8 times 9/11,
| every year! Your comment is whataboutism.
| saghm wrote:
| Even as someone who absolutely adores dogs and always is
| happy when one is around, this is a pretty silly argument.
| It's clearly possible to operate a doctor's office with zero
| dogs present, but I've yet to see one successfully operate
| without at least one. That said, for the past two years,
| every time I've been to a doctor's office, there _have_ been
| measures in place to keep the number of humans there as small
| as possible, which I think is entirely reasonable.
| voxic11 wrote:
| The vast majority of those deaths are from dog spread rabies
| right?
| patall wrote:
| In most non-western countries, yes. Not so in the UK: https:/
| /en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fatal_dog_attacks_in_t... A
| lot of those happened after an epileptic seizure. Which are
| not quite rare in doctors offices.
| glitchc wrote:
| You seem to have a fear of dogs. Want to talk about it?
| jjcon wrote:
| I'm afraid of most of the things on this list (including
| plenty of humans)
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_deadliest_animals_to.
| ..
| jjoonathan wrote:
| I'm allergic. Want to talk about it?
| Jtsummers wrote:
| If you read the article and not just the title, the
| majority of the discussion is using dogs for diagnostics of
| collected samples. They (for that use) would not be around
| patients like you so wouldn't trigger your allergies.
| patall wrote:
| But for those applications, you would probably prefer
| giant pouched rats that are much cheaper to train and
| keep.
| Jtsummers wrote:
| If they work as well or better for the purpose, then
| sure.
| glitchc wrote:
| Sure, I get the allergies argument, especially if the
| reaction is a deadly one. It's a good reason to avoid dogs.
| I have an allergy too, although not to dogs. It's not
| EpiPen level, but I do keep a bottle of Benadryl handy at
| all times. I totally get the life or death vibe.
|
| But calling dogs killers because one is allergic to them is
| a bit disingenuous no? People are allergic to many things.
| It's not the thing that's the problem, rather the
| individual body's overreaction in the presence of the
| thing. The problem is with the body, not the allergen,
| wouldn't you agree?
| dheera wrote:
| Well yes, I've been in far more life-or-death situations with
| dogs than humans, and they give me panic attacks.
|
| On multiple occasions I had a group of dogs chasing me on a
| mountain road while I was on my bike with trucks on one side
| and a cliff on another.
|
| Don't fault me, I had every right to be there in peace, and
| enjoy my bike ride. No wild animal bothered me, just the
| goddamn dogs.
|
| I don't want dogs anywhere near me.
|
| And yes, statistically they are far more dangerous than
| bears, mountain lions, and wolves combined, in terms of both
| injuries and deaths, even if you exclude rabies cases.
|
| Dogs were bred to fearlessly attack anything unknown and
| that's exactly what they do.
|
| Wild animals, on the other hand, generally fear the unknown
| and stay away from it.
| glitchc wrote:
| Dogs chase people and things for many reasons. Almost
| always it's for play. If a dog has its ears and tail up,
| it's looking to play with you, not tear you to pieces. Dogs
| have clear signals and behaviours that need to be
| understood.
|
| > Dogs were bred to fearlessly attack anything unknown and
| that's exactly what they do.
|
| This is completely untrue and the complete opposite of how
| dogs evolved. Dogs were domesticated to live among humans
| in harmony. If you experience a poorly behaved dog, it's
| the owner at fault. Some owners mistreat their dogs and/or
| raise them with poor social habits, causing the dog to
| behave aggressively towards humans. It's learned distrust,
| for which you have people to blame. Good owners will treat
| their dogs well. Such dogs will not attack another person
| unless their owner is being physically harmed. I don't know
| if you're living in America, most dogs in North American
| society come from well-adjusted homes where people treat
| them as members of the family.
|
| You can learn how to make friends with any dog. It can be
| taught. The fear you experience is learnt and can be
| unlearnt.
| dheera wrote:
| > Almost always it's for play.
|
| No, fuck that. Being chased on a mountain road is life-
| threatening and it's the dog's fault, not mine. Literally
| no other animal does this, they are nuisances.
|
| > If a dog has its ears and tail up, it's looking to play
| with you, not tear you to pieces. Dogs have clear signals
| and behaviours that need to be understood.
|
| No, fuck that. In MY language: mellow
| purring = friendly barking = threat
|
| Period. If it barks, I will bark back and assert my
| dominance, followed by pepper spray and rocks if it
| continues to approach and threaten.
|
| If I move away or yell at an animal, that means NO and do
| NOT follow me. Almost all other animals including cats
| usually understand CONSENT and what "NO" means very well.
|
| > If you experience a poorly behaved dog, it's the owner
| at fault.
|
| Well, 90% of dogs I've encountered don't have owners and
| many of them threatened me. Often in packs. The few dogs
| I've met that have owners, at least half of them were
| very badly behaved.
|
| 100% of bears and coyotes I've encountered don't have
| owners either, and to this date every single one I
| encountered has left me alone.
|
| > You can learn how to make friends with any dog.
|
| I really just do not want to. Like most cats and
| porcupines, I really just want to be left alone by dogs.
| That's my choice, and I want to be respected and dogs to
| respect that I do not wish to be approached, sniffed,
| barked at, or chased.
|
| I'm more than happy making friends with other animals,
| and do not need dogs in my life _at all_.
| WhitneyLand wrote:
| I've been on more mountain roads and trails than I can
| recall, encountered plenty of dogs and not had a single
| threatening moment let alone an injury.
|
| I regret to hear of your phobia, but both of our
| experiences are just anecdotes with no weight to argue
| from.
| dheera wrote:
| Gaslighting is not welcome here. You might be lucky. Your
| words come off as essentially arguing that just because
| _you_ haven 't experienced X that the problem is not
| significant. Many people attempt to use logic like this
| for X={racism, sexism, ...} but it applies to other
| things including traumatic interactions with dogs.
|
| Also, there are plenty of people I know with the same
| experiences as me.
| WhitneyLand wrote:
| How on earth are you calling my comment gaslighting? I
| merely pointed out that both of our examples are a single
| person's data point, and we cannot draw broad conclusions
| from them.
| dheera wrote:
| I don't think being chased by packs of dogs on _several
| dozen_ instances in at least 5 countries counts as a
| single data point.
|
| Maybe dogs hate the way I smell and love the way you
| smell but that doesn't make it right.
|
| I do carry defenses (rocks, pepper spray) to deal with
| the situation and avoid injury but having to be on guard
| for dogs at every second and ready to pull out these
| things on a moment's notice is NOT a pleasant way to
| cope.
| WhitneyLand wrote:
| I said it's a single person's data point. And it is.
| You're hypersensitive on this issue. Clearly you know the
| math and the statistics to know what one persons
| experiences mean to drawing conclusions.
|
| I respect your wish not to feel threatened and I tried to
| show that, no need to make incorrect replies.
| dheera wrote:
| > You're hypersensitive on this issue.
|
| https://repeller.com/what-youre-too-sensitive-really-
| means/
| paulcole wrote:
| Worldwide or in developed countries?
| rubyn00bie wrote:
| Where did you get your numbers? I'm so confused because the
| paper you linked doesn't seem to support what you're saying in
| the slightest. It really just seems like you hate dogs.
|
| > [...] Dogs kill 25 thousand people a year
|
| I don't see it in the paper and it's a HUGE discrepancy. Do you
| mean globally? Again where did you even get that number? The
| ONLY reference I see is this from a CDC paper [1]:
|
| > From 1979 to 1994, dog attacks resulted in 279 deaths to
| humans in the United States, resulting in an average of 17 to
| 18 deaths per year.
|
| Sooo... Less than 20 deaths per year, up-to 21 in the worst
| case estimate, in a country (USA) where ~34 million households
| have dogs. I'm seriously perplexed, dawg. Did you read the
| paper or just link to it assuming no one will even skim it?
|
| [1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9182209/
| jjcon wrote:
| > the paper you linked doesn't seem to support what you're
| saying in the slightest.
|
| The paper was part of my edit just looking at the 4.5 million
| attacks in the USA alone (where rabies is essentially gone)
| to point out that it isn't just rabies that makes them
| unsafe. Here you can read about the 25k deaths:
|
| https://www.bbc.com/news/world-36320744
| bandrade wrote:
| This is an incredibly disingenuous statistic. The 25,000 is
| from rabies due to bites from feral dogs. This would not be an
| issue in medical settings where the canines would be
| vaccinated.
| avalys wrote:
| Dogs are not safe? As in, the therapy dog that comforts sick
| children in the hospital might actually bite their face off at
| any moment?
| aaron695 wrote:
| codr7 wrote:
| Not sure I like where this is going, now I'm imagining dogs
| patrolling public areas and tagging random people for mandatory
| Covid quarantine.
|
| Not being able to smoke a joint before crossing a border without
| risking harassment was bad enough.
| slowmovintarget wrote:
| This is about using dogs to help with diagnosis. Anything the
| medical staff would learn from the dogs would still be covered
| under doctor-patient confidentiality.
|
| Training dogs to help could provide cheaper, more accurate
| tests that are less invasive and less painful for patients.
| This has nothing to do with "hassling" you.
|
| I'd be more concerned with the ethics of using dogs for
| COVID-19 detection given that dogs are susceptible to SARS-
| CoV-2 infection.
| codr7 wrote:
| I suggest reading the article and not being so damn naive.
| kadoban wrote:
| If we can accurately pick out which people are contagious with
| Covid, should they not be forced to quarantine?
| mwint wrote:
| No, they shouldn't at this point. Especially in areas where
| everyone who wants to is vaccinated.
|
| Government-forced quarantine was only valid - if ever - at
| the beginnings of a disease where little was know. It's not
| valid when we know the disease poses minimal threat to the
| majority of the population, and only slightly above minimal
| to a minority.
| jedberg wrote:
| > Especially in areas where everyone who wants to is
| vaccinated.
|
| Right now that is nowhere in the world, because kids under
| 5 still can't get vaccinated.
| mwint wrote:
| https://data.cdc.gov/NCHS/Provisional-COVID-19-Deaths-
| Focus-... indicates 347 Covid deaths in the 0-4yo
| category, since Jan 2020. Out of a population of around
| 16M in the US, ignoring churn in that category.
| jedberg wrote:
| That's nice, but we have no idea what the long term
| effects of COVID infection is on young children. We do
| know that in adults the long term effects are lessened
| when they are vaccinated, and we can assume the same in
| children. So it's still a valid concern.
| renewiltord wrote:
| We do not know about the long term effects of the MMR
| vaccine is either. Will kids who received it instantly
| die at the age of 60? We don't actually know.
|
| Another valid concern.
| mmarq wrote:
| Well, then I don't want anybody who isn't fully immunised
| against measles or meningococcus to get anywhere near my
| child
| jedberg wrote:
| The prevalence of those diseases is much lower than COVID
| right now, so your argument doesn't really work.
| mmarq wrote:
| They are also way more dangerous for a 5 month old baby.
| jedberg wrote:
| Ok then keep your five month old at home (that's what you
| want me to say right)? And now you want to say "then keep
| your four year old at home"
|
| But there is a huge difference between the socialization
| needs of a child under one (when they get their measles
| vaccine) and a child under five. Children between 3 and 5
| go to pre-school and need to interact with people for
| their psychological well being. So it's on us as a
| society to make it safe for them to so.
|
| And meningococcus usually spreads through deep kissing,
| so as long as your infant is French kissing an infected
| adult it should be fine.
| kayodelycaon wrote:
| Long story short, dogs aren't reliable enough to be medical
| devices.
|
| The whole "police dog" comparison is completely misleading. Drugs
| dogs are hilariously unreliable and are explicitly used by some
| departments solely to create probable cause.
|
| And with SAR dogs, they don't need to be reliable at tracking as
| long as they are better than humans.
| umvi wrote:
| Have there actually been studies that put drug dogs to the test
| under controlled conditions?
|
| Just looking at airport stats isn't enough. A drug dog might
| sniff trace amounts of drugs on clothing, but a search may not
| turn up anything because the trace amounts are from days
| earlier. Or maybe the contraband is too well hidden to be
| found, and so the drug dog's signal is labelled a "false
| positive" because the search failed even though it really was a
| true positive.
|
| Even if a drug dog is only right 50% of the time, that's still
| pretty incredible odds unless literally 50% of the population
| is carrying illegal drugs at any given time.
|
| I'm not saying that I don't believe drug dogs used as an excuse
| to manufacture probable cause, but I also don't believe the
| concept of an accurate drug-sniffing dog is impossible,
| considering blood hounds can detect and follow extremely dilute
| traces of a person's scent.
| kayodelycaon wrote:
| Something like 80% of us paper currency has trace amounts of
| cocaine on it. Which means anyone carrying cash is likely
| carrying drugs.
| Ariarule wrote:
| The article gives _good_ sensitivity and specificity numbers
| for dogs, under appropriate conditions.
| perfecthjrjth wrote:
| The whole "police dog" is a supreme court approved way to
| subvert the fourth amendment:
| https://reason.com/2011/02/18/four-legged-warrants/
| sidewndr46 wrote:
| On the contrary, they are 100% reliable. They always detect
| drugs when they are present. They also detect drugs when they
| aren't present. But hey, probable cause is just a pesky
| constitutional law concept anyways.
| Ekaros wrote:
| Has this been blind tested? That is for example simulated
| mules carrying well protected drugs at end of the long day?
| guerrilla wrote:
| So more like 150%-200% reliable
| mmh0000 wrote:
| Here, have some free citations. This is something which I
| believe everyone should be aware of:
|
| "Drugs dogs are hilariously unreliable and are explicitly used
| by some departments solely to create probable cause."[0][1][2]
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florida_v._Harris
|
| [1] https://www.utahcriminallaw.net/drug-sniffer-dog-false-
| posit...
|
| [2] https://www.smh.com.au/environment/conservation/sniffer-
| dogs...
| bell-cot wrote:
| A better title: Why Aren't There More Dogs in Medical Labs,
| Sniffing & Screening Samples?
|
| Quick answer: What major stakeholder or gatekeeper would favor
| that situation? Beyond obvious regulatory issues, dogs sniffing
| samples is not patent-able, high-tech, high-status, nor high-
| profit.
| Buttons840 wrote:
| Someone once said that dog's noses are the closest thing we have
| to Star Trek tricorders. In Star Trek a tricorder is a handheld
| sensor that can seemingly detect anything in any situation, and
| as a Star Trek fan this description has always stuck with me.
|
| Perhaps one day we'll master electronic noses, but until then,
| dogs seem under utilized. If anyone's looking for a high
| difficulty, high impact way of changing the world, look at
| electronic noses.
|
| Human smell is also under utilized. I had a friend with a severe
| peanut allergy who could enter a house and immediately tell if
| there were peanuts in the house. Presumably most people possess
| such senses, but have no reason to use them.
| amelius wrote:
| It's kind of strange that the first sensor that evolution built
| is the last sensor to be implemented in electronics (if ever).
| nhoughto wrote:
| interesting to think about the amount of 'information' that
| is present in an environment (like smells) that we aren't
| privy too and don't understand. Its easy to assume it doesn't
| exist and then be surprised when a trained dog knows someone
| is sick immediately.
|
| The information (in the form of chemicals etc) is there we
| just can't sense it via machine or otherwise, puts the idea
| of technological superiority into perspective.
| Angostura wrote:
| Chemistry and electronics are difficult bedfellows. The other
| senses can be emulated quite nicely in pure electronics
| anadem wrote:
| A new study shows that ants are as effective as dogs at detecting
| cancer, and can be trained to do so in as little as 30 minutes
| [0]
|
| That doesn't explain dogs' absence, but one day it might.
|
| [0] https://www.healthcarepackaging.com/quick-
| hits/article/22118...
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