A charity which is training dogs to detect coronavirus in the hope they can be deployed at UK airports says it has been in discussions with the government and remain ‘hopeful’ the project will work. 

Claire Guest, CEO of Medical Detection Dogs, which has dogs trained to detect cancer and malaria, says its dogs can detect diseases in less than a second.

She believes its dogs, among them cocker spaniels and a Labradoodle, could be used to test people arriving at UK airports when lockdown measures are relaxed. 

On Monday the Daily Mail reported around 15,000 passengers were still flying into the UK every day, without any tests when they land. 

Claire Guest told the BBC’s Today programme: 'We're in discussions with the government, we're very hopeful that they will support this and see there's a huge value in this.'

The CEO explained how the testing process would work in the UK's airports: 'People are coming in and may be asymptomatic or pre-symptomatic those few days when you’ve got the virus and don’t know it.

'A dog is sniffing each person in turn - it takes 0.5 of a second, the dog quickly identifies which people need a test and need to go straight into isolation to prevent the further spread around the UK.'

The charity’s website details the six dogs who are being taught to find Covid-19 with the help of London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) and Durham University.

The group of three working cocker spaniels, a Labrador, a Labradoodle and a Labrador golden retriever cross could be trained in six to eight weeks, but £500,000 funding will be needed to complete the training, Ms Guest said.

She told the BBC: 'We know that diseases have got these unique odours, we know how rapidly (dogs are) able to identify them, that’s why they’re used for drugs and explosives.

'It’s exactly the same with a disease,' she added.

MailOnline