Autonomous Robots Are Helping Kill Coronavirus in Hospitals

The absolute best way of dealing with the coronavirus pandemic is to just not get coronavirus in the first place. By now, you’ve (hopefully) had all of the strategies for doing this drilled into your skull—wash your hands, keep away from large groups of people, wash your hands, stay home when sick, wash your hands, avoid travel when possible, and please, please wash your hands.

At the top of the list of the places to avoid right now are hospitals, because that’s where all the really sick people go. But for healthcare workers, and the sick people themselves, there’s really no other option. To prevent the spread of coronavirus (and everything else) through hospitals, keeping surfaces disinfected is incredibly important, but it’s also dirty, dull, and (considering what you can get infected with) dangerous. And that’s why it’s an ideal task for autonomous robots.

UVD Robots is a Danish company making robots that are able to disinfect patient rooms and operating theaters in hospitals. They’re able to disinfect pretty much anything you point them at—each robot is a mobile array of powerful short wavelength ultraviolet-C (UVC) lights that emit enough energy to literally shred the DNA or RNA of any microorganisms that have the misfortune of being exposed to them.

The company’s robots have been operating in China for the past two or three weeks, and UVD Robots CEO Per Juul Nielsen says they are sending more to China as fast as they can. “The initial volume is in the hundreds of robots; the first ones went to Wuhan where the situation is the most severe,” Nielsen told IEEE Spectrum. “We’re shipping every week—they’re going air freight into China because they’re so desperately needed.” The goal is to supply the robots to over 2,000 hospitals and medical facilities in China. [READ MORE]