Three feet high, with blue and yellow flashing antennae and a head shaped like a stylish toaster, A Tie is among the first of an army of “intelligent nursing robots” that will be deployed across China to ease pressure on its heavily-burdened elderly care system.
But at a care home which is being used as a pilot for the ambitious scheme, residents view the machines more as dancing and singing companions, a high-tech replacement for a family that is too busy to visit.
A Tie (pronounced ‘R Tear’) is one of ten machines that have been living with residents of the Social Welfare Centre in the eastern city of Hangzhou since May.
Officials are desperate to address a looming crisis in China’s elderly care homes caused by more than three decades of the one child policy.
The draconian birth control measures, which were scrapped a year ago, created a rapidly ageing population and a dwindling workforce that is struggling to fund their welfare.
China launched a Five Year Plan in March to create a 30 billion yuan (£3.5 billion) industry in “service robots” that will be mobilised across a range of industries including the country’s care homes.
The plan calls for “intelligent nursing robots” to help in “assisting the elderly and the disabled, as well as providing medical recovery”.
But when The Telegraph visited the Hangzhou project this week, the only “therapeutic” assistance being administered by robots was a rather boisterous sing-a-long – led by an excitable A Tie.
“The robots make us happy when they dance and sing, because we are old and we are unable to dance anymore,” said Mrs Shen, a retired gynaecologist.
Moment’s earlier, the 88-year-old’s face lit up as A Tie rolled theatrically into the centre of the resident’s communal area.
Darting between wheelchairs and Zimmer frames, the robot swung its white metal arms in rhythm to old ballads and modern dance tunes blasting from speakers built into his ears.
A Tie’s moves prompted a wave of euphoric clapping and singing from the more energetic residents. Others greeted the robot by smiling or waving, as a room of elderly people might welcome a friend’s lively six-year-old grandson to their gathering.
The more fragile and ageing residents leant forward in their wheelchairs, nodding approvingly in A Tie’s direction, as if to show manners to the friendly machine.
“Can you give us another song A Tie?” shouted Mrs Shen. “Dance! Dance!” she continued, as the impromptu karaoke session grew increasingly rowdy.
A Tie’s makers, Zhejiang Woosiyuan Communication Technology Co, say the robot is more than a dancing jukebox.
It can be fitted with important medical functions, including reading pulses, testing urine samples and informing carers when to carry out routine checks on patients, said marketing manager Sun Jian, who added that his company was in talks to introduce A Tie into more care facilities.
A Tie currently reminds residents about their medicine. But for Mrs Shen, robots will never be able to replace nurses.
“I know myself which medicines I should be taking. I don’t need robots to remind me,” she said.
“If the robot reminds me to take a medicine which is not the same as what I remembered, then I’d only trust myself.”
A Tie’s’s dancing and singing provides important emotional support to the elderly, said Mr Sun, who described the function as “family love companionship”.
Most of the residents of the care home said they have few visitors as their offspring are busy working in other cities.
Filial piety is a virtue in Chinese culture, but decades of economic growth has led to many focusing more on their careers than caring for parents.
China is one of a handful of countries to have laws that allow the elderly to force their adult children to take care of them, and at least one village names and shames neglectful offspring.
In 2013 Beijing passed a law that aims to compel adult children to provide emotional support and visit their ageing parents.
Mrs Shen said she understands that her son, who is a surgeon, cannot visit often as he is busy supporting his family.
Her friend, Zhao Qiuying, aged 82, also recognises that grown-up children sometimes have more important commitments.
“They are busy working, so it is better they don’t come,” said the former dancer at one of China’s state-owned dance ensembles.
“Before, I had expected that they might come to see me,” added Mrs Zhao, who has two children and two grandchildren.
“But since I have robots, it is fine that they rarely visit me.”
(source: Telegraph)