Health in Emergencies – Canadian Red Cross 2013-2018

The project aims to save lives, reduce suffering, and maintain human dignity in communities experiencing emergency health crises by ensuring the delivery of timely, effective health services. The project supports the Canadian Red Cross Society and the broader International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement (RCM) to prevent and reduce deaths during humanitarian crises, and to support local health systems to return to pre-emergency states of operation. As part of the First Responder Initiative, the Canadian Red Cross Society developed two emergency field hospitals to assist emergency operations lead by the RCM. This project builds on this initiative by improving the flexibility of the field hospitals. This is achieved by creating stand-alone medical units that can be deployed one at a time in response to smaller emergencies, or together as a full field hospital for larger emergencies. The project also aims to strengthen the regional health response capacity of the RCM, with a particular focus on the Americas. The project assists the America’s RCM regional office in creating mobile regional medical units, which are scaled-down versions of larger Red Cross emergency field hospitals. These regional medical units are designed to meet the specific health needs of populations in the region during small- to medium-scale emergencies. The project also supports the development of new research, resources, and training curricula related to improving emergency health responses. This project falls under the larger DFATD – Canadian Red Cross Strategic Partnership to Enhance Canada’s Humanitarian Assistance.