Arogya Setu wristbands to monitor patients’ movements
The Centre is preparing to procure thousands of wristbands which will be embedded with its Arogya Setu app to monitor movements of patients in both hospital and house quarantine, and also help frontline workers take adequate care when they visit houses for screening of patients.
Broadcast Engineering Consultants India will pitch the designs to AIIMS and other government hospitals this week and then to state governments. BECIL will look at the commercial aspect of procuring technology the government needs and is working with Bengaluru and Gurgaon-based startups on designing the tool.
As the emphasis is on home quarantine, wristbands will help in remote monitoring, help health professionals know people’s temperature and symptoms. The numbers are going to be significant as more and more people will be asked to self-isolate, an official said. Technical bids for the wristbands closed on Monday, and now the PSU, along with senior government officials, is reviewing the designs.
“Each infected person has the ability to infect 100 others. So the numbers under monitoring will be huge in the coming days. The wristbands will ensure that people quarantined with suspected infections stay at a designated place. If they take it off, the hospitals will be informed. Once integrated with Arogya Setu app, there will be many more parameters which will be available for the health officials’ supervision,” the official said.
Online meetings have been set up with company heads to discuss the 'proof of concept,' of the design, an official said.
“Several states have told us how they are using a lot of manpower and resources to track movements... This will be helpful to frontline workers to monitor patients’ health and also be warned when they enter risk zones,” he added. The wristbands could be priced at around 2,200 a piece, which could be less if the demands go down.
Maharashtra and Karnataka already have a home quarantine tracking system, while Kerala uses GPS solutions extensively.
According to the technical document, the tool will also “detect, prevent and investigate threats to national security using CDR, IPDR, Tower, Mobile Phone Forensics Data, and Open Street Maps, Google Maps and Offline Maps without internet”.
The band would monitor “everyday behaviour of the person, including where s/he orders food from and the places s/he regularly visits, the multiple routes s/he could take”.
"The tool should be able to easily identify close contacts, frequent contacts as well as occasional contacts such as Uber drivers etc, and be able to collect information like where the suspect has spent most of his/her time and who all he or she has met," the document said.
Several countries have ramped up their surveillance to keep track of COVID-19 patients. Taiwan has a mobile phone-based ‘electronic fence’ that uses location-tracking technology, while Hong Kong had mandated an electronic wristband on infected people to keep them quarantined.
Experts, however, have also raised serious questions about privacy and civil liberties with the use of these tools.
Broadcast Engineering Consultants India will pitch the designs to AIIMS and other government hospitals this week and then to state governments. BECIL will look at the commercial aspect of procuring technology the government needs and is working with Bengaluru and Gurgaon-based startups on designing the tool.
As the emphasis is on home quarantine, wristbands will help in remote monitoring, help health professionals know people’s temperature and symptoms. The numbers are going to be significant as more and more people will be asked to self-isolate, an official said. Technical bids for the wristbands closed on Monday, and now the PSU, along with senior government officials, is reviewing the designs.
“Each infected person has the ability to infect 100 others. So the numbers under monitoring will be huge in the coming days. The wristbands will ensure that people quarantined with suspected infections stay at a designated place. If they take it off, the hospitals will be informed. Once integrated with Arogya Setu app, there will be many more parameters which will be available for the health officials’ supervision,” the official said.
Online meetings have been set up with company heads to discuss the 'proof of concept,' of the design, an official said.
“Several states have told us how they are using a lot of manpower and resources to track movements... This will be helpful to frontline workers to monitor patients’ health and also be warned when they enter risk zones,” he added. The wristbands could be priced at around 2,200 a piece, which could be less if the demands go down.
Maharashtra and Karnataka already have a home quarantine tracking system, while Kerala uses GPS solutions extensively.
According to the technical document, the tool will also “detect, prevent and investigate threats to national security using CDR, IPDR, Tower, Mobile Phone Forensics Data, and Open Street Maps, Google Maps and Offline Maps without internet”.
The band would monitor “everyday behaviour of the person, including where s/he orders food from and the places s/he regularly visits, the multiple routes s/he could take”.
"The tool should be able to easily identify close contacts, frequent contacts as well as occasional contacts such as Uber drivers etc, and be able to collect information like where the suspect has spent most of his/her time and who all he or she has met," the document said.
Several countries have ramped up their surveillance to keep track of COVID-19 patients. Taiwan has a mobile phone-based ‘electronic fence’ that uses location-tracking technology, while Hong Kong had mandated an electronic wristband on infected people to keep them quarantined.
Experts, however, have also raised serious questions about privacy and civil liberties with the use of these tools.
T