Remote control As touch, taste and smell were affected by covid, war rooms in hospitals used sight and sound to monitor patients. Now a new war room that links all hospitals in the State is being readied for the third wave Covid affects three of your five senses. You lose your sense of taste and smell, and touch is forbidden for fear of infection. At such a time, sight and sound bear all the weight of human communication. The very first war room and visual monitoring system set up at the Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Chest Diseases (RGICD), tapped into these two senses to monitor patients and keep them communicating with their loved ones.