Help has finally arrived at the Circolo hospital in Varese, on the frontline dealing with enormous numbers of patients in the area hardest hit by the coronavirus outbreak.
And it has come in the form of six robots.
Italian doctors use robots to keep distance
The child-size machines, with large blinking eyes, work in some of the most infectious wards.
One of them has been named Tommy after the son of the head of the intensive care unit.
The robots can relay back vital information from patients taken from machines reading vital statistics.
Medical staff can also communicate with patients via the robots and vice versa.
Medical staff say the robots allow patients to be more closely monitored, more time is spent monitoring their recovery and highlight quickly any problems that crop up.
The northern region of Lombardy, centred on the financial capital Milan, has accounted for 43% of Italy's known coronavirus cases and 59% of deaths.
Varese lies sixty kilometres (37 miles) north of Milan and the Circolo hospital has been under attack from the virus for weeks.