News
Dr Tedros, WHO Director-General; Dr Mike Ryan, Executive Director of Health Emergencies Programme; Dr Maria Van Kerkhove, Technical Lead on COVID-19; Dr Nedret Emiroglu, Director of Country Readiness Strengthening; Flavio Salio, Network Leader for Emergency Medical Teams; Amb Toni Frisch, Chair of Emergency Medical Teams Strategic Advisory Group.
The Director-General's opening remarks at the media briefing on COVID-19 underlined the important contributions of the EMT Network in the response to COVID-19 pandemic noting over 180 international emergency medical teams and experts worldwide since the onset. Recognizing that a lot of progress was been achieved since the launch of the EMT Initiative, he stressed that EMTs have ensured specialised care to patients, additional bed capacity, and advised local health providers in case management in these difficult time.
WHO Director-General also announced the publication of updated Classification and Minimum Standards for the deployment of EMTs—“This represents a major step forward in ensuring emergency medical teams meet shared standards for quality of care, whether they are deployed nationally or internationally.”.
The Director-General thanked Ambassador Toni Frisch, the Chair of Emergency Medical Teams Strategic Advisory Group saying Frisch has played a critical role in guiding the EMT initiative over many years.