Coronavirus: The Innovative Technologies That China Is Using To Combat Covid-19
At the heart of the coronavirus epidemic in China, in the city of Wuhan, all kinds of technologies are being deployed to fight the disease.
In dissimilar places you can see disinfectant robots, smart helmets, drones equipped with thermal cameras and even advanced facial recognition software and the the Chinese president Xi Jinping himself who has called on the country’s technology sector to help fight covid-19 as given.
In the battle against Covid-19, there are several emerging technologies that have made immense contributions in an unexpected, creative and surprisingly receptive way, said Lu Chuanying, a senior official at Global Cyberspace Governance, a Shanghai-based company.
China health sector is also profiting from technology to identify the symptoms of coronavirus find new treatments and control the spread of the disease which has so far infected more than 88000 people worldwide as of now.
Robots to the rescue
Several Chinese companies have developed automated technologies to carry packages without any contact between persons and to spray disinfectants or perform basic diagnostic functions to minimize the risk of infection as per the lis
Based in Shenzhen, which generally manufactures robots for the catering manufacturing, has installed its machines in more than 40 hospitals across the country to help medicalstaff and the medical MicroMultiCopter also in Shenzhen, is deploying drones to transport medical samples and make thermal images as given.
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Temporarily the most advanced artificial intelligence has been used to help diagnose the disease and accelerate the development of a vaccine.
Alibaba, the Chinese e-commerce giant, says its new diagnostic system based on artificial intelligence can identify a coronavirus infection with 96% correctness, the founder of Alibaba Jack Ma he has just proclaimed that his charity the Jack Ma Foundation will donate more than US $ 2 million for the development of a vaccine as per the given data.
There are many technologies that have helped “contain or curb the spread of the deadly virus, thus becoming one of the most reliable means to combat Covid-19 Chuanying wrote in an article for the state newspaper China Daily.
The state agency Xinhua posted a video on its Twitter account in which a robot is seen delivering food in the rooms of a hotel where there are travelers in quarantine.
And also check but is all this just a show:
Here state media apparatus even under normal conditions takes every opportunity to send a message about China’s technological sophistication, even if a story has little material says Elliott Zaagman they covers China’s technology industry and is co-host of the podcast China Tech.
They suspect that most of the stories we see about disinfection robots, drones and more, mostly just show wiles.
“However, we must not forget that the ‘less sexy’ part of technology has really played a role in the control of the coronavirus,” he told the BBC.
Era l big data and internet
Beyond robots and drones, China has also mobilized its sophisticated surveillance system to control infected people and establish quarantines.
Facial recognition cameras are common in China, and now companies are updating software to scan crowds in search of people with fever or to identify people who do not wear masks.
SenseTime, a leading artificial intelligence company, says its software to control the temperature of a person without contact has been implemented in underground stations, schools and community centers in Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen.
The company also claims to have a tool that can recognize faces, even if they wear masks, with a relatively high degree of precision, Additional Chinese artificial intelligence firm, Megvii, has a similar product, which has also been implemented in Beijing.
The Chinese newspaper Global Times reported that the authorities of the city of Chengdu, in Sichuan Province, have received smart helmets that can measure the temperature of any person within a 5-meter radius, sounding an alarm if it is discovered that they have fever.
As Chinese citizens slowly return to their jobs, mobile phones have also become a key tool to track the spread of the coronavirus.
Codes according to severity
An application called Alipay Health Code assigns people the color green, yellow or red, as they are allowed to enter public spaces or to quarantine them in their home.
To recognize possible virus carriers, it uses big data and has already been adopted in more than 200 Chinese cities. Tencent the company behind the popular WeChat messaging application, has launched a similar tracking feature based on QR codes, the close contact detector application notifies the user if they have been in close contact with a virus transporter.
In the era of big data and the internet, each person’s movements can be clearly seen, so now we have different tools regarding the Sars epidemic [in 2003], said Li Lanjuan, advisor to the National Health Commission, in an interview with Chinese state television, making full use of these new technologies we should find and contain the source of infection.
Privacy issues
While these new surveillance tools can be considered efficient, and perhaps necessary during a health crisis, they have raised concerns about privacy, also check the numerous of these health applications require users to register with their name, national identification number and telephone number as given.
Establishments also obtained data from telephone operators, health and transportation agencies as well as from state owned companies, in addition there is little transparency about how the government plans to cross-check the data, and there have been information that points to a leak of personal health data on the internet as listed.
As the applications become more popular, there is additional fear that it may exacerbate paranoia and lead to discrimination against coronavirus patients.
Surveillance system
The most critical voices say that China could take advantage of this health crisis to justify the expansion of its surveillance system, which is already huge and that human rights organizations have described as typical of a dystopia.
If there is a lesson that the Chinese authorities are learning here, it is to know where the ‘weak points’ of their surveillance apparatus are Zaagman said, and Confidentiality was already becoming something of the past in China and an eruption like this will only accelerate that process.