[ad_1]
The dogs have already been involved in the fight against COVID-19 at Dubai airport, which began using them in mid-August. Now it has been announced that the quadrupeds will also help detect the infection more quickly at Helsinki airport.
Finavia, who runs the airport, says it is not difficult to apply the coronavirus to the sensitive noses of dogs. Preliminary studies by researchers at the University of Helsinki Faculty of Veterinary Medicine show that dogs can smell COVID-19 by almost 100 percent. published in a Finavia press release. According to the researchers, dogs can smell the virus even if the person has no symptoms yet. This is not always possible even in laboratories.
For dogs to detect COVID-19, lower scales are also required than in PCR tests. A dog only needs 10 to 100 molecules to sniff out the virus, and the lab team needs 18 million.
8-year-old mestizo Kössi learned to smell the coronavirus in 7 minutes
There will be no way at the airport that dogs walking through the airport will simply smell COVID-19 from people. Travelers will not have any direct contact with the animal. People who will need to perform the test will scratch their face with a special cloth and throw it into a container that will be fed to the dog.
If the test is positive, the passenger will be sent to the airport health information center.
In the future, 4 dogs will work at the airport for one shift. A total of 16 dogs are trained for this job. Almost all of them have been used for sniffing before.
The time it takes an animal to smell COVID-19 depends on the dog’s experience. One of the dogs, the 8-year-old Kössi crossbreed, learned to smell the coronavirus in 7 minutes.
[ad_2]
