The START hospital, the Spanish emergency medical team deployed in Turkey to treat the victims of this week’s devastating earthquakes, will start its activity this coming Monday in the coastal city of Iskenderun, in the southern province of Hatay, the most affected by the earthquakes.
The emergency medical center has been set up with the participation of the 82 members of START, including 60 volunteer professionals from the Spanish public health service, as well as firefighters and logisticians from the Madrid City Council and Summa 112.
The team arrived on Friday at 05.30 local Turkish time at the airport in the city of Adana less than 72 hours after the formal request for help made by the Turkish government, one day after the arrival at the same airport of a cargo plane, chartered from Madrid by the Spanish Agency for International Cooperation for Development (AECID), with the components of the START field hospital and everything necessary to set it up.
After confirming the destination with the Turkish health authorities and the World Health Organization’s Emergency Medical Teams coordination team, the START was transferred on Friday from Adana to the outskirts of the city of Iskenderun.
From there, the center expects to start receiving patients from several localities as it is located at a key communication point of roads connecting several districts of the country, explains AECID.
«The START team is now finalizing the installation of the field hospital and the living areas for the staff in order to be able to offer a quality hospital service starting tomorrow, Monday, February 13,» adds the Spanish agency in a statement published on Sunday.
The START hospital has the capacity to treat about 200 patients each day, as well as to perform up to seven major and 15 minor surgical procedures in its field operating room. It can also accommodate up to 20 patients in its inpatient area.
The team also includes two mental health specialists provided by the NGO Doctors of the World, who will provide psychosocial support to patients and their families. In addition, the NGO Farmamundi provides a pharmacy specialist and the NGO Cesal provides the kitchen staff to feed the hospital patients and the rest of the team.
This week’s catastrophic earthquakes in Turkey and Syria have already claimed the lives of more than 28,000 people as the international community continues its relief efforts and rescue teams make a final push to continue to find survivors.
According to the latest official toll on Saturday night, provided by Turkish Vice President Fuat Oktay, at least 24,617 people have died in Turkey alone, where the number of injured is 80,278. In neighboring Syria, 3,553 people are reported dead and 5,276 injured, for a total of 28,170 deaths.
Source: (EUROPA PRESS)
