There are now bees that can smell if you have been infected by coronavirus.
As we learned from Business Insider, scientists in the Netherlands have been training bees to identify the virus by smelling it out, according to a press release from Wageningen University. The study was done at Wageningen University's bio-veterinary research laboratory with more than 150 bees. Each bee was given a treat whenever they were exposed to the scent of a mink that had been infected with COVID. When the bees were given a sample that did not have COVID, they would not get a treat. This is also known as Pavlovian conditioning. Through this method, the bees began to be able to identify an infected sample of COVID within seconds. When they did they would stick their tongues out to try and collect the treat aka sugar water.
Although this method has been tested, we doubt you'll be swarmed by bees before entering events. However, these animals could come in handy for identifying COVID in low-income countries that don't have access to the type of tests we have here in America.
Currently, the Wageningen scientists are working on a machine that could automatically train multiple bees to help with testing for coronavirus.
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