Request to support WHO in responding to COVID-19 pandemic.
The WHO has reached out to IFHE for our help responding to this crisis. As President of the IFHE, I am urgently seeking your help.Dear Colleagues,
As you know, the world is now in the grips of the Coronavirus, a highly infectious disease that threatens to overwhelm the capacity of many healthcare systems.
The IFHE is in official relations with the World Health Organization, and in that capacity IFHE represents more than 10,000 healthcare facility professionals around the world. The WHO has reached out to IFHE for our help responding to this crisis. As President of the IFHE, I am urgently seeking your help.
The WHO has developed design templates for creation of various kinds of emergency facilities for dealing with the virus. They need teams of volunteers who will be willing to work with hospitals and countries to quickly create design documents specific to the needs of a given location. Sometimes this will be a new structure, and sometimes it will be the conversion of an existing structure or facility.
In essence, a hospital who needs help will contact the WHO. The WHO will reach out to the IFHE, and the IFHE will recommend skilled teams to work with the hospital in need. The WHO will provide the volunteer teams with their standards, templates, requirements and training. The task of the volunteer team will be to work with the available WHO templates, and tailor them to the specific needs of the particular hospital. Obviously, time will be of the essence, and there will be little or no opportunities for site visits. Thus, the documents will be the best that can be provided under these circumstances.
The IFHE is now seeking volunteer teams willing to work in this kind of volunteer arrangement. We need complete teams of healthcare design professionals, including architects and engineers.
If you are able to provide us with details of a team, please forward the following information to us as soon as possible:
Architect Firm: Project Manager: Email and Telephone: Brief description of healthcare expertise:
Engineer Firm: Project Manager: Email and Telephone: Brief description of healthcare expertise:
Due to the nature of the acute respiratory illness associated with coronavirus, engineering and design specialties that include medical devices, medical gases and intensive care facilities are particularly sought after.
In addition, if you have, or are aware of any individuals who are interested in volunteering, who are not part of a team, please also provide their contact information and qualifications as well. This may be of particular interest to retired members of your organization or network who have capacity to provide experience or professional support.
This is an incredibly important request from the WHO and as time is of the essence, we look forward to receiving your response by April 30th.
Importantly we realize we cannot reach every potential volunteer, so I encourage you to share this appeal as widely as possible within and throughout your own professional networks. This is not limited to IFHE membership or member countries.
Your responses should be sent via email to the IFHE Secretariat at internationalcovid19@iheem.org.uk
Yours truly,
Darryl Pitcher International President, IFHE