(Dan Tri) – Dubai Police has established a special unit of 38 sniffer dogs that can detect people with Covid-19 with high accuracy.
A dog is trained by Dubai police to sniff out people with Covid-19 (Photo: Reuters).
Dubai Police, United Arab Emirates (UAE) has trained a special team of 38 dogs of many different species such as German shepherds, hunting dogs… to detect people with Covid-19.
These dogs have the ability to recognize odors through sweat samples of people confirmed to have Covid-19.
`A very small amount of sweat is then placed in a vial. It has the patient’s scent. We then give the sample to the dog to smell… Each time it gives the correct signal, we give it a treat
In the center’s large training room, police led dogs along a row of metal boxes, of which only one box contained sweat samples from people with Covid-19.
Covid-19 sniffing dogs in Dubai (Photo: Reuters).
Officer Fatima al-Jasmi, who is part of the team training dogs to detect Covid-19, said training such sniffer dogs is a challenge, because police have to learn a new skill according to international standards.
Airports in the United Arab Emirates were among the first in the world to test using dogs to detect people with Covid-19 in 2020. These dogs are no longer in use.
According to the results of research on the ability of dogs to detect Covid-19 conducted by UAE University of Technology and Abu Dhabi Federal Customs Authority and published in June in Communications Biology magazine – a publication of the scientific journal
Dogs are trained to sniff out Covid-19 at the K9 training center in Dubai (Photo: Reuters).
Some other countries including Finland, the US and France also conduct dog training and testing programs using dogs to detect Covid-19.
Officer Falasi said the dogs on the team perform about 30 to 40 checks a day.
`It does the test regularly. It can do more than 1,000 sniffs of Covid-19,` officer Falasi said about the dog he trained.
Officer Salah Khalifa al-Mazroui of Dubai Police said Dubai has received requests from around the world to share knowledge on how to train dogs to sniff out Covid-19.
Dubai Police also have dogs trained to sniff out drugs and explosives, skills that will be put to use as Dubai prepares to open the Dubai Expo2020 world fair next month.
