#COVID19: Dog Company Proposes Training For Dogs to To Smell Coronavirus, Requests For £1million Donation

In a bid to help reduce the number of health workers who have to use test kits for COVID-19 tests, a dog training company, Medical Detection Dogs, has asked for a donation of £1million so it can train dogs to learn the smell of coronavirus.

According to Medical Detection, this will save health ministries from spending so much in producing and buying test kits. The charity said that dogs could learn the smell of coronavirus within six weeks.

In a statement issued by the dog company they said that dogs are one of the world’s greatest biosensors, capable of detecting odours associated with food, drugs and explosives and are now being used in public health practice.

“In principle, we’re sure that dogs could detect Covid-19. We are now looking into how we can safely catch the odour of the virus from patients and present it to the dogs,” Dr Claire Guest, CEO and Co-Founder of Medical Detection Dogs said.

According to him, the aim is that dogs will be able to detect both symptomatic and asymptomatic persons. He insisted that it would be fast, effective and non-invasive.

It will “make sure the limited NHS testing resources are only used where they are really needed,” he said.