This Spanish journalist has hit the headlines after using a thermal camera to check his temperature live on-air outside a makeshift coronavirus hospital and registering a fever.
Journalist Lorenzo Diaz was reporting from the IFEMA conference centre which has been turned into a hospital to fight COVID-19 in the Spanish capital Madrid for TV channel Telecinco when he showed the viewers the thermal cameras being used on those accessing the building.
The host in the studio Isabel Jimenez said that the cameras had been put in place to find anyone whose temperature registered above 37.5 degrees, one of the first symptoms of coronavirus.
Diaz went on to explain that the cameras only have three-tenths of an error margin and said he was going to be tested by the cameras himself.
He said: “I am going to go up to one of those cameras and when I am in front of it, you will see my body temperature.”
When he stepped in front of the camera an alarm sounded and the images showed his body temperatures was 38 degrees, 0.5 degrees higher than is permitted for those entering the building.
Diaz tried to explain that “now it is sounding (the alarm) because we have checked it a lot and we are a bit nervous, but this is what happens. My name is in red and a small alarm starts to sound when the temperature is 37.5 degrees or above.”
Local media report he took his temperature twice again after the broadcast and registered 36.7 degrees and 36.5 degrees. Reports state the strong lighting used during the broadcast is believed to have been the cause for the temperature increase.
It is unclear if the journalist has been tested for COVID-19.
According to the latest figures from the Johns Hopkins University, Spain has registered 172,541 cases of COVID-19, with 18,056 deaths.
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Story By: Ana Lacasa, Sub-Editor: Joseph Golder, Agency: Newsflash
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