Em_bracelet

The Embracelet: participation for all in our new societies By Joris Jan Voermans & Marieke Hanekamp, The Netherlands

Problem: why this initiative? The measures regarding the coronavirus throughout Europa are gradually being phased out and society is slowly starting open up again. As far as we can see now, keeping distance from each other will be important for a long period of time. However, this will become a challenge more and more. For example, in the supermarket, at the schoolyard, in public transport and at work. This can create difficult situations for people with vulnerable health, and even hinder them from going out. Especially if it’s not visible to others that someone has a (chronic) disease or lives or works with a vulnerable person. A part of this huge group might not feel safe when society is opening up again and will stay at home, with all the consequences (psychological and economic) that entails.

Soluction: the Embracelet To help those people, we want to introduce the Embracelet: a recognizable and easy to wear bracelet that kindly reminds others to keep their distance – especially now society is opening up again and more and more challenging situations will occur. People who want to keep distance, can choose to wear the Embracelet. These might be people with a vulnerable health condition, but you can also think about people who work in vital sectors, or live with a person who is diagnosed with a severe disease. For them it is necessary to keep distance, but they need others to help them with this.

Impact to the crisis: participation in society by all citizens! The Embracelet allows people with vulnerable health conditions to regain confidence to take up their life outdoors step by step. When everybody is aware of the message the Embracelet sends out, our target groups will gain trust and dare to rely on their environment more and more. Trust is essential to build, and that is what we need to do right now. Especially now, people need to take part in society, go back to work and rebuild our beautiful countries! We think that keeping your distance to others is the sweetest thing you can do right now. Actually, it’s the new embracement!

Some more details o Recognizable bracelet in 3 sizes (small, medium and large). o Low costs; 5 euros per bracelet (including VAT). o Hygienic material. o Send in an organic bag in an envelope with a card included. o Branding-possibilities for investors and partners. o Website will be launched in a few days, in different languages. o A part of the proceeds goes back to charity. o We applied for funding at our regional governance and hope to hear from them next week o A local initiative (37 organisations amongst 3 hospitals) might launch this initiative!

Next steps It seems that our initiative might be picked up locally… but of course the next step is to get all regions of the Netherlands and all of Europe in touch with the Embracement! The problem described it not locally nor Dutch or European: all countries facing Corona will sooner or later, at their own best way, open up again. The Embraclet can be of help for millions of citizens who need to gain trust to participate in society again.

We need partners, promotion and funding to help us reaching this!

Value of the solution after the crisis The value of the Embracelet after the crisis is none. Therefore we are thinking of getting people into action to send their bracelet back to us. We are in contact with an artist who can recycle the bracelets and make art from it! This piece of art will remind us to the corona pandemic ánd the good things that also went out of this crisis.

Prototype We received the first, tailor made Embracement! See:

Furthermore we are working on a website.

Results of the hackatlon During this weekend, we participated at the hackatlon. We were complete newbees, never joined a hackatlon before… and it was overwhelming. It was impressive to see how knowledge was shared, how ideas were popping up and worked out with help of others. We got in touch with several persons and their feedback/suggestions/links to other products helped us to sharpen our idea of the Embracelet. Many thanks to all!!!

Who are we? We are Marieke Hanekamp and Joris Jan Voermans, living in the oldest city in The Netherlands: Nijmegen. After a speech by our Prime Minister Mark Rutte on the 21st of April, we are completely aware of the fact that our societies will need to adapt gradually and constantly to this new reality we live in. We don’t want to sit still and wait, but created this idea to help those with vulnerable health conditions participating in this new society. If this is going to be a success, we are going to support charity with part of the profit!