Russian president Vladimir Putin is being protected from coronavirus by a special “disinfection tunnel” that anyone visiting his home outside Moscow must pass through, the state-controlled RIA news agency reported on Tuesday.
The special tunnel, manufactured by a Russian firm in the town of Penza, has been installed at the official Novo-Ogaryovo residence outside Moscow where he receives visitors, it said.
Demo footage of the tunnel, published by RIA, showed masked people passing through it being sprayed with disinfectant from the ceiling and from the side.
The Russian news agency described the disinfectant as a fine cloud of liquid that covered people’s clothes and any exposed upper body flesh.
It is not thought that SARS-CoV-2 – the coronavirus that causes Covid-19 – can live for long periods of time on fabric. Health advice in the UK has focused on regular handwashing and keeping a distance of two metres from other people.
Dmitry Peskov, Putin’s spokesman, said in April that anyone meeting Putin in person was tested for the coronavirus. A month later, Peskov said he had himself been infected.
Russia has recorded more than 500,000 infections, the third-highest number of cases in the world after Brazil and the United States – something it attributes to a massive testing program.
Russia has registered 7,284 deaths so far, fewer than numerous other countries. Critics are dubious about the accuracy of its mortality figures.
Two more disinfection tunnels have been installed in the Kremlin, according to the Press Association.
In April, US president Donald Trump suggested injecting people with disinfectant to cure them of Covid-19 – and then finding a way to irradiate them internally – during a public press conference.
He later claimed he had been “testing reporters”.
Additional reporting by Reuters.