Automated Care-Taking and the Constitutional Rights of the Patient in an Aging Population

Social Robots represent a broad spectrum ofAI-based robotic applications that could be largely deployed in the care of elderly and frail individuals, primarily to reduce associated welfare costs. Indeed, they could provide assistive (feeding, cleaning, moving),monitoring (health parameters and overall well-being of the user), and companionship (entertaining and interactingwith the user) services. This chapter questions whether all these uses are to be deemed licit, and pursuant to which criteria. To do so, it first describes the different kinds of robotic applications divided into categories pursuant to the functions they serve. Then it defines the right to carewithin the existing legal framework, in light of international conventions, constitutional principles, and national provisions. In so doing it shows howcare is kept distinct from mere cure, and entails addressing the overall well-being of patients, including their socialization, personal independence and dignity. The different technologies are then assessed. To do so, alternative ethical paradigms are considered, typically recalled in the bioethical debate revolving around the use and acceptability of advanced technologies. The analysis shows how a deontological approach is the only one that conforms to the current constitutional framework. Reference is made to the ethical and legal notion of human dignity as an external and objective criterion that limits freedom of self-determination, and prevents humans from being manipulated (in their emotions), instrumentalized and isolated. Technologies that could be deemed deceptive—inducing the delusional perception that the machine cares for the user—and whose primary purpose is to replace human relations and contact, should be deemed violating the fundamental rights to care and the dignity of the individuals being cared for. Instead, those technologies that favour physical and psychological independence should be not just welcomed but eventually supported through ad-hoc policy initiatives.