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Training for Intranasal and Oral Swabs to Test for COVID-19

There have been a number of voluntary diagnostic behaviors that have become standard training goals for animals in managed care. Some of these include training animals to stand on scales, hold position for hand injections, present hooves for trimming, and blood collection among others. With the introduction of the novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV2, we believe it is time to consider adding voluntary intranasal and/or oral swabs as behaviors to practice regularly especially with those species most vulnerable to the virus.

Animal Training Consultant Barbara Heidenreich, Annette Pedersen (Animal Training Coordinator at the Copenhagen Zoo), Veterinary Staff and Zookeepers from the Copenhagen Zoo have collaborated to create the course. We are very happy to share this (and encourage sharing) so that other zoos can utilize this information to easily collect samples as needed. We highly encourage sharing the link to this page.

Course Authors:
Barbara Heidenreich - AnimalTrainingFundamentals.com
Annette Pedersen - The Copenhagen Zoo

With support and special thanks to Keepers and Veterinary Staff members from the Copenhagen Zoo