We know from people that some like to poke their noses with devotion. What most people don’t like: when others do the same, especially with extra-long cotton swabs, looking for viruses. We know of dogs that they like to read the latest news with their noses, sniffing is part of day-to-day business. This is how they perceive things that for us have no odor of their own, such as counterfeit money, explosives – or coronaviruses.
In the future, residents of old people’s homes will benefit from this ability to save them the trouble of PCR tests and cotton swabs. In the “La Roselière” facility in Kunheim, Alsace, a specially trained Golden Retriever will, for the first time, regularly test the residents and employees for an infection. In any case, the presence of animals has a calming effect on the elderly. Not least because they don’t pull out a long cotton swab and only give you the choice between sneezing and choking: “Nose or throat?”
In addition, the two-year-old Pokaa attended a French university for veterinary medicine, so is more or less an academic. Imagine if alcohol tests were carried out on such a cultivated Golden Retriever in the near future: window down, sniffing, treats, thank you, done.
Nobody has to be afraid of being wetted across the face and back by a juicy dog’s tongue: For the test, a discreet sniff at a sweat sample is sufficient.
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