Lebanon trains dogs to sniff out COVID-19 infections

By Masood Sattar Khan
(Pakistan News & Features Services)

With Lebanon’s coronavirus (COVID-19) numbers in the midst of a troubling upswing, officials announced that they were training police dogs from the country’s various security agencies to detect the smell of the virus in sweat. 

According to a television report, Lebanon has joined a number of countries that have been testing the effectiveness of canines in sniffing out COVID-19, including Germany, Finland, Chile, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). 

The dogs in Lebanon were being trained at an Internal Security Forces barracks in the town of Aramoun, south of Beirut. 

Lebanon’s Health Minister, Hamad Hassan, conceded that the initiative was desperately needed in the prevailing circumstances. 

Lebanese surgeon, Riad Sarkis, worked on a proof-of-concept study to evaluate the efficacy of using dogs to detect COVID-19 in collaboration with a French team led by Professor Dominique Grandjean of the National Veterinary School of Alfort in France, with testing conducted in both countries. 

Grandjean claimed that two specially trained dogs would have the capacity to search about 4,000 people per day.