Re‐purposing humanoid robots for patient care in <scp>COVID</scp>‐19 pandemic

Abstract

Re-purposing humanoid robots for patient care in COVID-19 pandemicTo the Editor, Increasing number of COVID-19 patients, shortage of human resources and protective gears is alarming.Healthcare workers (HCW) are at highest risk of infection.Around 20% of HCW in Italy and over 3000 in China are infected. 1COVID-19 has led to a huge demand-supply mismatch of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE). 2 Reducing the number of on-floor HCW, thus reducing the exposure and need for PPE appears to be the best strategy and robots might be useful to achieve the same. 3 Use of robotics in previous pandemics such as Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), Avian flu, Ebola and other highly transmissible infections has been tried in various parts of the world. 4Three main areas of interest were mentioned as patient care, logistics and reconnaissance in a workshop held during Ebola outbreak. 5 Applying similar principles, we have conceptualized the utility of robots in COVID-19 patient care areas.