Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern is waiting "with interest" for trial results of dogs used to sniff out COVID-19, another line of defence against the virus being rolled out across the globe.
"Some of the work being done overseas I think is really promising," Ardern said on Monday. "We have been very open in a range of areas to the use of dogs in prisons, Customs, biosecurity, and so yes absolutely open to using them for COVID as well."
The United Arab Emirates became the first country to deploy dogs specially trained to detect COVID-19, and trials have also been rolled out in Chile, the UK, Germany and Finland. Even Australia is planning a trial in the coming months.
It comes after researchers in France conducted a study to evaluate if the sweat produced by patients with COVID-19 could be detected by dogs. The researchers found "high evidence" that dogs can detect if someone has the virus.
"Scent detection by animals has been published in a large number of diagnostic studies, which all suggest similar or even superior accuracy compared with standard diagnostic methods," the National Veterinary School of Alfort study found.
"We conclude that there is a high evidence that dogs can detect a person infected by the virus responsible for COVID-19 disease."
Ardern said she is open to the idea of running a trial. But she also noted how there aren't that many COVID-19 cases in New Zealand which could be a barrier to training the dogs locally.
"One issue I'd say is that obviously training them requires the ability for them to operate in real-life scenarios and our level of COVID in New Zealand is such that we may have to look at ways that we could support that training given our current status."
The Ministry of Health reported no new cases of COVID-19 in New Zealand on Monday, and there are now just 27 active cases in the community, with 28 in managed isolation facilities.
COVID-19 is currently detected in New Zealand by health workers conducting a viral test, which is done by taking a swab, most commonly from the patient's nose or throat.
Laboratories in New Zealand have so far processed more than 951,000 COVID-19 tests.
The Government has set aside hundreds of millions of dollars to secure a COVID-19 vaccine for New Zealand when it becomes available.
