Could The Albany Airport Have COVID-19 Sniffer Dogs In The Future

I think we can all agree that the world of travel is going to change forever after the coronavirus pandemic. Especially flying and airports.

We've already seen some changes, like passengers wearing masks, temperature checks, and social distancing when possible in airports and on flights. Extra cleaning in between flights and no more food or beverage service.

Well, the next change might come in the form of a four-legged friend. Coronavirus sniffing dogs. We've seen dogs at the airport sniffing for drugs, or contraband or bombs, but not sniffing passengers to see if they're sick.

According to www.timeout.com, "The clever pups in question are all either Labrador retrievers or cocker spaniels. The gang currently in training have been nicknamed ‘The Super Six’ and they are the heroes our travel industry needs in this trying time."

In the UK there are six dogs undergoing training to see if they can sniff out travelers that are carrying the coronavirus. Whether they have symptoms or not.

Professor James Logan, lead researcher on the project, and head of the department of disease control at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine is confident the trial will yield results.

"It builds upon years of research that we've already done as a team to demonstrate that people who have a malaria infection have a distinctive body odor and we've shown that dogs can be trained to detect that with very high accuracy," says Logan. CNN

You've probably heard about dogs that can smell cancer or other diseases on humans...well, this is the same principle. Since dogs can't catch COVID-19 they are the perfect "scanner" to find sick individuals so they don't fly and infect more people.

Researchers hope these dogs could screen up to 250 people per hour and if it all works out they could start training hundreds of dogs to work in airports all over the UK.

So don't be surprised in the near future if you're traveling from Albany International Airport if you get sniffed by a pooch in the near future.