Since COVID-19 exploded on the scene, many African nations have been scrambling to get response actions in place. Essential workers are especially vulnerable across the world, and Rwanda is making major moves to curb coronavirus exposure. Rwanda has deployed five state-of-the-art humanoid robots to aid its efforts against the virus.
The robots were recently unveiled at a public ceremony and are designed to limit the exposure of healthcare workers to the virus. The robots are capable of; delivering food and medication, screening temperatures of up to 150 people per minute, and can even determine if individuals are wearing masks or not; and reminds them to wear one if needed.
The robots were developed by a Belgium-based company (Zora Bots), and cost approximately £2,700. Now that they are officially Rwandan owned, they’ve also been given local names — Mwiza, Ikizere, Akazuba, Urumuri and Ngabo. Training of the staff required to operate the new robots will take about a month. Rwanda already anticipates the need for additional robots to perform other non-medical duties such as disinfection of public space.
As yet, Africa Center for Disease Control (Africa CDC) has noted over 95,000 cases of COVID-19 infections across the continent.However, most experts suggest that the reported numbers are unreliable due to low testing rates; as is the case in most of the developed nations too. Rwanda’s data shows 314 positive coronavirus cases; 216 have recovered and zero fatalities have been reported. As shown in this prominent unveiling, many have referred to Rwanda as the ‘Singapore of Africa.’ However, some criticism has been directed towards Rwanda’s government regarding questionable enforcement methods in efforts to implement social distancing and quarantine mandates.
