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Korean boffins build COVID-bot to shove a swab right up your hooter

Yes, this will help health pros. But after seeing it thrust a swab into your schnoz, you may want to avoid testing by humans or robots

VIDEO The South Korean Institute of Machinery and Materials has developed a robotic rig capable of shoving a COVID-19-sputum-sampling-swab right up your hooter, so that medicos don’t have to come into contact with possibly-contagious patients.

The robot is remotely-controlled, with a joystick-like device allowing staff to aim a swab at your schnoz and then some kind of poke-o-tronic sliding device to move it in and out of your orifices. The rig offers feedback on the force imparted to the swab so that operators can guide it with optimal accuracy.

You’ll appreciate that accuracy because if you are tested for COVID-19 guidance for tests recommends swabs be inserted into a nostril to a depth equal to the length of your index finger. According to acquaintances of your humble hack who’ve been tested that feels like having someone poke in through your nostril to approximately the back of your skull.

Anyway, here’s how it works. The squeamish among you may wish to turn away at the 0:48 mark, when the boffins get rather graphic.

Youtube Video

In case any of that was uncomfortable, the rig also offers realtime voice and video comms between patient and medical staff.

The bot is suggested as a way to keep medical staff safe and to reduce the need for personal protective equipment and the hassle of putting it on and off. Institute boffins suggest it will be useful for all sorts of diseases other than COVID-19. ®

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