US nursing home opts for wearable contact tracing

A nursing home in Texas, USA, started using wearable technology developed by CarePredict to expedite contact tracing of its residents and staff, according to Reuters. The wearable wristbands use infrared rays to connect to beacons mounted on the walls of each room to record interactions and the details such as who, where, and for how long. When one of the nurses was suspected of having caught the Coronavirus, the elderly home was able to create a list of staff and residents who needed to be isolated within five minutes thanks to the nurse’s movements recorded in the system. The article speculates that this technology may be too costly and complex; however wearable Bluetooh devices that communicate with each other may be more suitable for contact tracing.