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arxiv: 2605.20445 · v1 · pith:RNYJ62E2new · submitted 2026-05-19 · 💻 cs.CV · cs.AI

A Comprehensive Comparison of Deep Learning Architectures for COVID-19 Classification on CT & X-ray Imagery

Pith reviewed 2026-05-21 06:56 UTC · model grok-4.3

classification 💻 cs.CV cs.AI
keywords COVID-19 classificationdeep learningconvolutional neural networksX-ray imagingCT scansResNetVGGmedical image analysis
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The pith

ResNet and VGG models distinguish COVID-19 from normal lung images in X-ray and CT scans at 95 to 98 percent average accuracy.

A machine-rendered reading of the paper's core claim, the machinery that carries it, and where it could break.

The paper tests a range of pre-trained convolutional networks on two X-ray datasets and two CT scan datasets to build an automated system that separates COVID-19 cases from healthy ones. It reports that ResNet and VGG architectures deliver the highest results among the models tried. A sympathetic reader would care because the work points toward AI tools that could speed up initial screening when radiologists face high volumes of lung images during a respiratory outbreak.

Core claim

Among the tested networks—VGG16, VGG19, DenseNet121, ResNet50, ResNet50V2, ResNet101V2, MobileNetV2, Xception, InceptionV3, ResNetV2, EfficientNetB0, and NASNetLarge—ResNet and VGG variants achieve the strongest separation of COVID-19 from normal images, reaching average accuracies of 95 to 98 percent on the X-ray and CT collections.

What carries the argument

Transfer learning with pre-trained convolutional neural networks applied to lung X-ray and CT image classification.

If this is right

  • The best-performing models can be incorporated into computer-aided diagnosis pipelines for rapid COVID-19 screening from lung scans.
  • ResNet and VGG should be prioritized over the other tested architectures when building similar lung-image classifiers.
  • The reported accuracies match or exceed earlier published results on comparable tasks.

Where Pith is reading between the lines

These are editorial extensions of the paper, not claims the author makes directly.

  • If the accuracy holds on broader data, hospitals could deploy these models to triage patients before full radiologist review during high-demand periods.
  • The same comparison approach could be repeated on other respiratory diseases to check whether ResNet and VGG remain the top performers.

Load-bearing premise

The chosen X-ray and CT image collections represent real clinical variability and contain no selection biases or label noise that would inflate the reported accuracies.

What would settle it

Running the same ResNet and VGG models on a fresh collection of X-ray and CT images gathered from multiple hospitals with no overlap to the original datasets and measuring whether accuracy falls below 95 percent.

Figures

Figures reproduced from arXiv: 2605.20445 by Arslan Shaukat, Basim Azam, Sarmad Khan, Umer Asgher.

Figure 2
Figure 2. Figure 2: Proposed Architecture for Image Classification [PITH_FULL_IMAGE:figures/full_fig_p003_2.png] view at source ↗
read the original abstract

COVID-19 was a significant challenge that led to the loss of numerous lives daily. Not only a certain country was involved in this outbreak, but even the world has suffered because of the coronavirus. Imaging techniques using computed tomography (CT) and X-rays of the lungs are the most useful tools for the COVID-19 or any other pandemic disease screening process. Technology today has revolutionized the world by using artificial intelligence to replace manual processes with automated machines, which enable the system to imitate the human brain by making wise decisions based on experience. Motivated by this, our work proposes to use convolutional neural networks (CNN) based models for designing a computer-aided diagnosis (CAD) system that differentiates between COVID-19 and healthy lung pictures. We used two different sets of X-ray images of the lungs in addition to two different sets of CT scans and the classification is done using a variety of networks that have been pre-trained such as VGG (16, 19), Densenet (121), Resnet (50, 50 V2, 101 V2), Mobile net (V2), Xception Inception (V3, Resnet V2), Efficient net (B0) and Nasnet (Large). On the X-ray and CT image datasets, Resnet and VGG architecture have shown the ability to properly differentiate COVID-19 from normal images, with an average accuracy of 95 to 98 percent respectively. Our acquired results on the classification datasets are competitive and superior to previously reported findings in the literature.

Editorial analysis

A structured set of objections, weighed in public.

Desk editor's note, referee report, simulated authors' rebuttal, and a circularity audit. Tearing a paper down is the easy half of reading it; the pith above is the substance, this is the friction.

Referee Report

2 major / 2 minor

Summary. The manuscript compares a range of pre-trained CNN architectures (VGG16/19, DenseNet121, ResNet50/50V2/101V2, MobileNetV2, Xception, InceptionV3/ResNetV2, EfficientNetB0, NASNetLarge) for binary classification of COVID-19 versus normal lung images on two X-ray collections and two CT collections. It reports that ResNet and VGG models achieve 95–98% average accuracy and claims these results are competitive with or superior to prior literature for computer-aided diagnosis.

Significance. A well-documented empirical comparison of standard architectures on public COVID imaging data could serve as a useful reference for CAD system design. However, the absence of dataset sizes, splits, validation protocols, and bias audits means the 95–98% figures cannot be independently verified or generalized, substantially lowering the work’s current significance.

major comments (2)
  1. [Abstract] Abstract: the claim that ResNet and VGG achieve 'an average accuracy of 95 to 98 percent respectively' is presented without dataset cardinalities, class balance, train-test split details, cross-validation method, or confidence intervals. These omissions make the central performance numbers unverifiable from the given text.
  2. [Methods/Results] Methods/Results sections: no provenance, acquisition dates, patient-wise splitting strategy, or bias audit is supplied for the 'two different sets of X-ray images' and 'two different sets of CT scans.' Early COVID-19 public datasets are known to contain hospital markers, inconsistent RT-PCR labels, and leakage risks; without explicit checks the reported accuracies cannot be interpreted as evidence of architectural superiority.
minor comments (2)
  1. [Abstract] Abstract: the sentence 'Resnet and VGG architecture have shown the ability to properly differentiate COVID-19 from normal images, with an average accuracy of 95 to 98 percent respectively' is ambiguous about which dataset yields which accuracy figure; clarify the mapping.
  2. [Results] Consider adding a table that lists per-model accuracy, precision, recall, and F1 on each modality to allow direct comparison rather than the summary statement alone.

Simulated Author's Rebuttal

2 responses · 0 unresolved

We thank the referee for their detailed and constructive review of our manuscript. We agree that improved documentation of datasets and experimental protocols will strengthen the work and make the reported results more verifiable. We address each major comment below and will revise the manuscript accordingly.

read point-by-point responses
  1. Referee: [Abstract] Abstract: the claim that ResNet and VGG achieve 'an average accuracy of 95 to 98 percent respectively' is presented without dataset cardinalities, class balance, train-test split details, cross-validation method, or confidence intervals. These omissions make the central performance numbers unverifiable from the given text.

    Authors: We agree that the abstract should be self-contained. In the revised manuscript we will expand the abstract to report the total number of images in each of the four datasets, the class balance (COVID-19 vs. normal), the train-test split ratios, the use of patient-wise partitioning, the cross-validation procedure (5-fold), and 95% confidence intervals derived from the cross-validation folds. These additions will allow the 95–98% accuracy figures to be directly assessed from the abstract. revision: yes

  2. Referee: [Methods/Results] Methods/Results sections: no provenance, acquisition dates, patient-wise splitting strategy, or bias audit is supplied for the 'two different sets of X-ray images' and 'two different sets of CT scans.' Early COVID-19 public datasets are known to contain hospital markers, inconsistent RT-PCR labels, and leakage risks; without explicit checks the reported accuracies cannot be interpreted as evidence of architectural superiority.

    Authors: We acknowledge the importance of these details. The revised Methods section will name the exact public sources of the four datasets, include any documented acquisition dates, and explicitly describe the patient-wise splitting strategy used to avoid leakage. We will also add a dedicated limitations subsection that discusses known issues with early COVID-19 datasets (hospital markers, label noise) and the mitigation steps taken in our pipeline. While a comprehensive post-hoc bias audit was not part of the original experimental design, we will provide a transparent assessment of these risks and their potential impact on the comparative results. revision: partial

Circularity Check

0 steps flagged

Purely empirical comparison with no derivation chain or self-referential predictions

full rationale

The paper reports direct experimental results from training and evaluating pre-trained CNN architectures (VGG, ResNet, etc.) on X-ray and CT image datasets for COVID-19 classification. No mathematical equations, fitted parameters presented as predictions, or derivation steps exist. Claims of 95-98% accuracy are stated as observed outcomes on the chosen collections, with comparison to prior literature being standard benchmarking rather than load-bearing self-citation. The study is self-contained as an empirical benchmark and does not reduce any result to its own inputs by construction.

Axiom & Free-Parameter Ledger

2 free parameters · 1 axioms · 0 invented entities

The central claim rests on transfer learning from ImageNet to medical images and on the assumption that the selected datasets capture the relevant visual features without domain shift or label errors. No new physical entities are postulated. Free parameters include the specific choice of which pre-trained checkpoints to use and the fine-tuning hyperparameters that are not reported.

free parameters (2)
  • Model architecture selection
    The paper chooses a specific subset of pre-trained networks (VGG, ResNet variants, etc.) for comparison; this selection is not derived from first principles and affects which accuracies are highlighted.
  • Fine-tuning hyperparameters
    Learning rate, number of epochs, data augmentation settings, and optimizer choices are required to reproduce the 95-98% figures but are not stated in the abstract.
axioms (1)
  • domain assumption Weights pre-trained on natural ImageNet photographs transfer effectively to CT and X-ray lung images for binary COVID classification.
    Invoked by the decision to start from VGG, ResNet, and EfficientNet checkpoints without domain-specific pre-training or adaptation layers.

pith-pipeline@v0.9.0 · 5821 in / 1767 out tokens · 61610 ms · 2026-05-21T06:56:16.891534+00:00 · methodology

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Reference graph

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