South Korea Deploys Cloned Drug-Sniffing Dogs

Hugh Pickens writes "BBC reports that six puppies cloned from a Canadian-born sniffer dog in late 2007 have reported for duty to check for drugs at Seoul's Incheon International Airport after completing a 16-month training course. The customs agency says clones help to lower crime-fighting costs as it is difficult to find good sniffer dogs. Only about 30% of naturally-born sniffer dogs make the grade, but South Korean scientists say that could rise to 90% using the cloning method. The puppies, each called 'Toppy' for 'Tomorrow's Puppy,' are part of a litter of seven who were cloned from a 'superb' drug-sniffing Canadian Labrador retriever called Chase at a cost of about $239,000. 'They are the world's first cloned sniffer dogs deployed at work,' says customs spokesman Park Jeong-Heon. 'They showed better performances in detecting illegal drugs during the training than other naturally-born sniffer dogs that we have.'"

Comments

Standing still

[Norsefire]

I followed the Snuppy project quite closely, (in fact I am the main contributor to the Wikipedia article - shameless plug), so it's great to see further developments stemming from that. However something that a Kennel Club spokesman said when Snuppy was first cloned comes to mind here:

"Canine cloning runs contrary to the Kennel Club's objective 'To promote in every way the general improvement of dogs' ... Cloning cannot be used to make improvements because the technique simply produces genetic replicas of existing dogs." [src]

So what they have now are the best drug dogs they will ever have, their abilities can't improve any - they will be the same as the dog they were cloned from.

Re:Standing still

[Em Emalb]

you're 100% correct...English Bulldogs are an abomination.

Did you know they can't even reproduce without artificial insemination? How is that considered a good thing? It's horrible. Our neighbors have one, and we dog-sat while they were gone. The poor thing could barely breathe. It was so bad, that when it was sleeping, if you didn't hear this rasping groaning snore coming from it, you'd think it was dying.

Unreal. I feel so badly for the dog. It's a sweet dog too, that's the thing of it. I just wish people would stop breeding them the way they do and let nature take its course.

Re:Standing still

[ljw1004]

On the other hand, the Kennel Club's ideas about "improvement" just mean that their committee picked an arbitrary and unhealthy dog aesthetic and then got breeders to breed towards it. There was no "improvement" in it at all...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7828455.stm

"The Kennel Club has introduced new standards for 209 breeds, following concerns about ill health in pedigree dogs caused by years of in-breeding. Last year, the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals pulled out of Crufts, saying breeding to exaggerate certain features, such as bulldogs' jowls, had led to painful deformities. Now new rules designed to prevent exaggeration and incestuous breeding have been brought in.

"Ryan O'Meara, from the K9 dog magazine, said the changes were long overdue. "When we breed dogs to a set of physical standards and ignore the health consequences, it's really unforgivable," he told the BBC News website. Mr O'Meara said the bulldog was "a vivid illustration of how wrong we can get it". "Bulldogs have been bred to a point where they die at about seven years of age - in human terms that's just 45 or 46," he said. "They can't breathe properly. They can't support themselves because their heads are too big. They have terrible skin conditions. "The public must be educated to see dogs not for their aesthetic appeal but to think about their health."

Re:Standing still

[Dunbal]

if all the dogs are genetically identical they will all have identical immune systems

      Bzzzt - wrong.

      Sorry, I'm a doctor, and I can't let this one slide. Not sure how it is in dogs, but it can't be that much different than humans. Although their immune system will be GENETICALLY the same, the nice thing about immune systems is that they learn and adapt throughout your life. You are not "born" with immunity to certain diseases. You ACQUIRE it. Animals are not like plants where a monoculture is vulnerable to a single pathogen. Plants don't have active, adaptive immune systems like animals do.

      While certain genetic disorders of the immune system would be cloned, in theory, these disorders tend to be rare. I think it would be safe to assume that the goal of the program was to clone healthy dogs. Provided these dogs get their shots, they should be just as "safe" as any other dog.

Re:Standing still

[Hatta]

These dogs are not just out there to find the little bag-o-mary in your inside coat pocket

But they'll happily get you for that too.

they are there to pick up on a variety of stronger drugs that are massively addictive

Like alcohol, tobacco, and caffeine?

and cause the country various troubles such as the extra crime created by the badly addicted running out of money but still needing their next fix

So by restricting supply we increase the prices of these drugs and amplify this problem. How does that help?

needing to run treatment programs for the addicted

Right, and how much does it cost to jail these individuals?

needing to fund medical care for the health complications that result from certain drug use and persist even long after the addiction is dealt with

What about the health complications that result from gang warfare that wouldn't exist in a regulated industry? Also, would not regulation and destigmatization of these drugs allow people to get treated earlier when it's cheaper? As it is, any addict sees doctors as the enemy, someone who wants to take their drugs away and force them into treatment. Change the legal status and we can change that relationship to something healthier.

Prohibition is bad any way that you look at it. Every problem it's intended to solve, it only makes worse.

Re:would the spots be the same?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, that was shown with cats a while ago :)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CC_(cat)