Excerpts from Fox32chicago.com:
The Chicago Fire Department on Friday rolled out its first ambulance outfitted to transport patients suffering from an infectious disease, a direct result of the city’s reaction to the worldwide Ebola scare of 2014.
The ambulance features a pressurized plastic tent and an air filtration system powered by a battery with a three-hour charge, according to Assistant Deputy Chief Paul Roszkowski.
The price tag of the pressurized tent — which can be installed in any standard ambulance — is $3,000. The city has one, and there are two on order of 13 that the department eventually wants. Each air filtration unit and battery also costs about $3,000. Grant money is being used to buy the tents.
Once the other two tents are delivered and two more ambulances are equipped, the fire department plans to place them in strategic locations around the city that will allow for the fastest possible response to any neighborhood.
In response to the Ebola outbreak, the Department of Homeland Security’s Customs and Border Protection in October 2014 launched extra screening at five airports, including O’Hare. But a year later, after screening more than 30,000 travelers for Ebola as they arrived at those airports from West African countries, federal health authorities said they never detected a single case of the often-fatal disease.
thanks Dan
#1 by KNWster on May 26, 2016 - 1:10 PM
According to CFD Media, the first kit was installed on Ambulance 12. If they hope to have 13 kits in the future, it would seem prohibitive to have so many special apparatus used for such a specific purpose. But then CFD likes their rainy day special rigs.
https://mobile.twitter.com/CFDMedia/status/733067072117301248
#2 by spoung45 on May 26, 2016 - 9:59 AM
will these be dedicated for this use only, and be used for a special call.
#3 by Bill Post on May 25, 2016 - 8:56 PM
My question is how will they ultimately deploy these pressurized tents. While the city wants to have several of them distributed and strategically located around the city so that they can get to a scene quickly, will they be on regular ambulance companies that are currently in service or will they (more likely) be placed in specially designated “on call ambulances” that would only be activated when use of these pressurized tents are warranted?
#4 by FireTroll on May 24, 2016 - 12:33 PM
What are they taking out of these ambulances to fit this new gear?