Commercial Robots – How Robots Can Help In A Medical Pandemic

The world is currently grappling with an unseen enemy in the form of a virus that causes fatal breathing problems. While the problem is medical, is there a way that robots can assist in the fight against the virus?

Over the years, robots have gradually evolved from the caged traditional robots to collaborative robots, which, in addition to handling manufacturing processes, can also work well alongside human workers. Numerous countries have used robots to help fight the prevailing virus pandemic. Here are some ways that robots can be used to improve the world to get back to normal.

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Crowd Monitoring

The most important prevention measure against the spread of the virus is physical distancing. Medical experts have advised that if you are going to be in a group, that you should at least stay 1m apart from other people. Commercial robots can be used to enforce this.

In restaurants, for example, the restaurant management can acquire a mobile robot and instruct it to pass the message around the restaurant, in intervals every few minutes. The robot can also be equipped with vision capabilities to help identify when the required distance is not kept and to then alert those not observing the distancing requirements.

Care For The Infected

As alluded to above, the virus is spread via close proximity to those infected. Thus it is essential to find a safe way to take care of the infected without having to infect those who are taking care of them. Robots are an easy and ideal solution to this problem.

Healthcare robots can be used to check on the patients, deliver food and medicines to the rooms and beds of the infected. The robots can also assist healthcare workers in lifting the sick, make their beds, and even keep them company. Robots have been used in the healthcare industry for a while now and have proved to be quite useful in this task.

Testing People For Infections

The testing process to identify those infected with the virus is quite invasive. Further, it is quite risky to those who are doing the testing. All that is required is for saliva droplets to drop on to the uncovered skin of the healthcare worker.

To help alleviate this shortcoming, robots can be used to carry out the testing process. It is a repetitive task that is right up the alley for tasks that robots can carry out. Robots are fast and efficient. There will be little room for error when robots are used for this process.

Home Delivery

All over the world, many countries have responded to this crisis by advising their citizens to shelter in place. For many people, this has led to an increase in home deliveries for a lot of things as more and more people remain at home.

To protect against infection for the delivery agents, robots can be used to get the delivery home. This would only need a small robot that gets the package from the delivery vehicle to the door rather than having it delivered by a human being.

Miscellaneous Activities That Help In The Prevention Of The Spread

Robots can also be used for many other activities that are important in the suppression of infections. One crucial task is temperature checks on people. These are carried out at the entrances of numerous public buildings. This is a task that building managers can have robots carry out smoothly and efficiently.

It is also essential that public places be regularly cleaned and sanitized in the fight against the virus. Cleaning robots can be assigned this task and programmed to clean certain high traffic areas frequently throughout the day.

Conclusion

Robots, as seen on the factory floor, may seem very boring and can often be seen only as a workhorse. However, commercial robots can also be put to other tasks. On this day, they can be used to help governments, hospitals and individuals to fight the prevailing pandemic.

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