Technologies that are Helping Us Get Through the Pandemic

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, there has been a surge of technology use, including digital learning, health, payments, and robotics.

How it Helps

These new developing technologies can help reduce the spread of the coronavirus while helping businesses stay open. Technology helps society become resilient in the face of the pandemic or other threats, and during the COVID-19 pandemic, these technologies are playing crucial roles in our society, to keep it running during the lockdowns and quarantines.There are some of the top technology trends that helps us build a more resilient and flexible society even through the pandemic.

Technology Example #1

First would notably be the online marketplaces platforms. Online shopping has become a necessity, as it is now being supported by formal logistics systems. The “in-person” delivery is not virus proof, so many countries located in the US and China are launching delivery services where goods are picked up and dropped off at a designated location. This minimizes the need for contact from human to human. Also many Chinese e-commerce giants are looking into robot deliveries, which have yet to come as the big companies need to set up clear guidelines for protocols to safeguard the condition of delivered goods. The companies are looking into clean banknotes. Contactless payment methods are under consideration to make sure that online purchases are in place of the traditional hand to hand exchange. The dilemma to this is that, since there are more than 1.7 billion unbanked people, there may be a huge population not being able to have easy access to digital payments.

Technology Examples #2

Remote working systems have been possible by technologies that contain virtual private networks (VPNs), voice over internet protocols(VolPs), virtual meetings, cloud technology, work collaboration tools, and facial recognition technologies that enable a person to appear before a virtual background to preserve the privacy of their indoor settings. However, remote work can impose some serious challenges such as information security and privacy. Timely tech support can interfere with productivity, and remote work has also complicated labor law issues, such as those that have been associated with the safe work environments such as income tax and a lack of work-life balance. If remote work becomes more common after the pandemic the employers may be able to decide to reduce the costs and hire people from regions of cheaper labor costs.

Not every work furthermore can be done from home, and according to US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 25% of the wage and salary workers world from home from 2017-2018.

Workers who have received college education are more likely to be able to work in a home setting than those who don’t. Some professions such as medical services don’t have other options at all, as they have to combat the virus in the frontlines. 191 countries have turned to remote learning since the pandemic, and technologies involved in at home learning learning such as virtual reality, augmented reality, 3D printing, and artificial intelligence-enabled robot teachers have been able to be implemented since then. The concerns about distance learning include wider possibility of technologies, creating a wider divide in terms of digital readiness and income level. This also creates a socioeconomic disparity and pressure on parents who need to stay at home and aid the children, facing decreased productivity at work. Telehealth was popular, as there needs to be an effective way to contain the spread of COVID-19 while providing essential primary care. In countries such as US, where medical costs are high, there needs to be a way to ensure telehealth to be covered by insurance, and a way to teach a level of tech literacy to operate.

New Usage of Past Technology #1

Online entertainment, due to the virus that has reduced the in-person interactions have been skyrocketing in demand, as many companies release films online. Museums, and international heritage sites offered virtual tours, and there also has been a surge of online gaming traffic since the outbreak. The supply chain 4.0 has created disruptions to the global supply chain, with the distancing and the quarantine orders. While demand for food and personal protective equipment has been soaring, some countries have implemented different level of export bans, to make sure that the supply chain system is not vulnerable to the pandemic. Core technologies of Fourth industrial revolution and Big Data, cloud computing, and the Internet of Things have been building a resilient supply chain management system for the future by enhancing the accuracy of data.

New Usage of Past Technology #2

3D printing has been soaring into use as the export bans on personal protective equipment has been implemented. Simple parts can be made on-site quickly, without any requirements of a lengthy procurement, and there is no need to wait for shipment. However, the massive production used by 3D printing also comes with some obstacles such as intellectual property issues. Other unresolved issues include the designing of files needing to be protected under patent regimes, and the placing of origins and impacts on trade volumes to the product liability associated with the 3D printed products. Robotics and drones has been in surge of use since the COVID-19 pandemic as the world becomes to realize how heavily humans need to be used to make things work. A strong push on the use of robots and drones to delivery objects has been in use, and new jobs are to come soon.

New Usage of Past Technology #3

5G and information communications technology has been soaring into use, as the 5G technology has demonstrated its ability to become important in remote monitoring and healthcare consultation. This adoption of 5G will increase the cost of data plans, and to address these issues to ensure inclusiveness to the internet will continue to be a challenge as the 5G network expands globally. It is because of our digital readiness, humans around the world have been able to minimize the detrimental effects of what a pandemic could have potentially caused. Digitization and the pandemic has been able to alter the world of jobs available to humans, and the mitigation of the impacts of the larger workforce across all industries and countries deserves recognition, and need to be under the spotlight so they can further come towards the timely and a human centered solution.