Huntah visits a classroom.
Benjamin Berke (Duke); Shutterstock.com (COVID, flower); David L. Ryan/The Boston Globe via Getty Images (Huntah)
These Dogs Can Smell Covid
Bow-WOW! Two dogs are working hard in Bristol County in Massachusetts. They’re helping to detect, or find, Covid-19 in schools.
Huntah and Duke had 10 weeks of training to learn how to sniff out Covid. They practiced by smelling masks of people who had the disease.
“Their noses are thousands of times more powerful than a human’s,” says Jonathan Darling. He’s part of the group that works with the talented pair.
The dogs visit about 25 to 30 schools every week. After entering schools, they go to certain areas to smell for Covid. If they find it, the dogs sit and wag their tails. This tells humans that they’ve found Covid.
The schools where Covid is detected don’t close. But the rooms are carefully cleaned.
“In a perfect world, Covid will go away,” Darling says. “In the meantime, we’ll gladly be here to help out.”
