Thank you for these thoughtful comments, we agree that we were a bit overly focussed on the results that supported the studies hypothesis and neglected to discuss the findings related to the dogs whose SRB appeared to have resolved. The number and percentage are detailed in the results section (lines 282-283 of the original submission and 298-298 in this one), but we failed to discuss these in the Discussion. We ran two models, one focussing on the dogs who started SRB- to see how many changed to SRB+ or remained SRB- and what factors influenced this, and the other focussing on dogs that started SRB+ to see what factors influence whether they changed to SRB- or remained SRB+. These models therefore, cover the comparisons you suggest (unless we’ve misinterpreted your comments). We have now added some discussion of the dogs who began the pandemic SRB+ however, as this was lacking from the first version (see the paragraph beginning at line 524).
2. Can you address the dogs that improved between Feb and Oct? You report the number of new dogs showing SRB but can you report on dogs that went the other way? What was the actual # and %? It seems you have compared within dogs that showed SRB in baseline and other models for dogs that did not. Seems a comparison between SRB- (baseline) → SRB + (post lockdown) and SRB + (baseline) → SRB- (post lockdown) dogs is critical and missing. This comparison seems essential—if some dogs get worse but some get better, than the argument that changes due to COVID might bring about new SRB becomes weaker.