Can I test my pet for COVID-19?

Definitely yes! And your veterinarians can help you test your pet for the novel coronavirus. According to the Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory at the College of Veterinary Medicine, your veterinarian has the capability to test your pet and you will find out faster if your pet is sick or not. 

All you have to do is to make a request if you want your pet to be tested in which you should specify why you want it to be tested, and that application must be submitted by your veterinarian. After this, the request will be sent to those dealing with animal cases and they will analyze your situation. If they detect a positive result, then these officials must be notified first. 

Unfortunately, the world in on alert because of the novel coronavirus, but we should stay calm and safe. Even though it is thought that COVID-19 originated in animals and humans have contracted it from them or various animal based foods, we do not know it for sure, because there is no scientific evidence to support this hypothesis. In addition, those animals that are believed to have created the virus were exotic, so do not worry about your pets. 

It is speculated that horseshoe bats are the reservoir species and the novel COVID-19 originated from these species, especially since SARS and MERS – which are other types of coronaviruses – came from bats as well and then they passed it to other animals species. But other scientists say that the new coronavirus has a natural origin and it has nothing to do with animals.

“By comparing the available genome sequence data for known coronavirus strains, we can firmly determine that SARS-CoV-2 originated through natural processes,” said Kristian Andersen, PhD, an associate professor of immunology and microbiology at Scripps Research. He concludes that the virus is the product of natural evolution.