Rats trained to sniff landmines, tuberculosis in Africa

In Mozambique, rats are trained to locate hidden landmines in the fields. African countries initially mocked the idea but now they want to enlist the rodents as well.

Rats are not pests -- they are invaluable landmine detectors at least for an African country. Thanks to a Belgium citizen’s suggestion, the rats are being used to detect landmines in Mozambique. Bart Weetjens is currently working in Africa on landmines. He got the idea of training rats, which have noses that are extremely sensitive to smell, able to detect the scent of hidden landmines. He trained the rats to scratch whenever they locate the smell of the vapor from land mines or the smell of disease like tuberculosis (TB). When the rats detect the landmine, their handlers reward them with a piece of fruit or a nut. Weetjens was asked don’t the rats simply scratch themselves to get food instead of detecting it first. Weetjens told Globe:

"That would be human behavior...The rats are more honest."

Weetjens implemented this plan in Mozambique. After seeing its success, other countries like Zambia, Democratic Republic of Congo want to have similarly trained rats. Rats are also used to detect TB in patients in Tanzania. The trained rats smell sputum samples at clinics in a similar fashion like they would detect landmines. Thanks to the rats they were able to detect 300 TB cases which were diagnosed incorrectly by the medical staff.