China: robots patrol the streets during confinement

Two years after the appearance of the Covid-19China is experiencing a new rebound of the epidemic to the point of confining cities of several million inhabitants such as Shenzhen, Shenyang and even Shanghai with a two-step confinement. In this immense megalopolis of 26 million inhabitants, the authorities have chosen to isolate half of the population for 15 days, then the other half afterwards.

To enforce this confinement and provide the usual health instructions, a resident saw a robot-dog land in the streets. the New York Post says that initially this resident thought it was a drone equipped with a loudspeaker which launched ” Wear a mask, wash your hands frequently, check your temperature “.

Used as a pet…

He then goes to the street and discovers a robot with a megaphone on the back ! This robot is well known since it is a model of Unitree RoboticsChinese equivalent of Spot, designed by Boston Dynamics. As we can see in the video, the megaphone is roughly taped to the robot, but it works… In Singapore, this same robot-dog is used in parks to check that the distance physical between people is respected.

In Shanghai, one is not necessarily surprised to come across a robot dog in the street, simply because some (wealthy) inhabitants have even adopted it as a pet! Its autonomy is about 90 minutes, and it can run at a speed 17 km/h. At the same time, there are also robots in companies. In Shenzhen, for example, a disinfection robot with ultraviolet is used in a canteen that can accommodate 1,200 people. The robot performs a complete disinfection of the cafeteria every evening.