From 1 October, Køge Municipality changes how it uses robot vacuums with a mopping function in home care. Residents on full care packages who cannot clean their own floors may now choose for themselves whether a person or a machine does it. Others can apply for an exemption, and the municipality names one group in particular: people with cognitive difficulties who cannot manage the technology in their own home. The new model rolls out over the coming year.
Danish municipalities brought these machines in to free up staff hours, and the argument has been about efficiency and self-reliance. What Køge has added is a switch. The technology stays, the saving presumably stays, but the person living in the home decides whether the cleaning arrives as a colleague or as a device. Small on paper, large in a living room.
So…:
Where have you rolled out technology without leaving anyone a way to say no?
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