On the surface, it looks like an ordinary white truck, clad with logos on its sides. A very ordinary vehicle, carried by six big wheels, which actually hides impressive unsuspected resources. Like these robots Transformers changing into racing cars with the snap of your fingers.
This white truck, a small marvel of technology born In Toulouse (Haute-Garonne), is still unique in Europe. It can very quickly transform into a mobile hospital, unfolding by bellows like a giant accordion. About thirty minutes and four people are enough to make it fully operational.
Total autonomy
Initially designed to provide assistance to victims of attacks, natural or industrial disasters, this care unit has been deployed since Monday, November 9 in Bayonne (Pyrénées-Atlantiques), near the emergency room of the Basque Coast hospital center. With the vocation of welcoming some patients with Covid-19 for two or three weeks. A rapid response to the saturation of resuscitation beds.
Eighteen patients
This permanent mobile hospital, measuring more than 66 m², has five air-conditioned rooms. It can receive up to eighteen patients: eight in absolute urgency and ten in relative urgency. Or twelve in intensive care, in a different medical configuration. It is very easily modular.
Its other strength is its total autonomy. It has its own electricity and computer network, water and gas for medical use. It also has the necessary equipment to take care of seriously ill patients: electric syringes shoots, respirators, oxygen bottles, ultrasound machine, scopes to monitor heart rate and blood pressure … Its roof can also support up to two meters of snow!
It is the culmination of three years of preparation, reflection and construction,
explains Prof. Vincent Bounes, head of Samu 31. It is a Franco-Spanish partnership between Toulouse, Bayonne, Navarre, Catalonia and Andorra. This mobile unit was created thanks to European funds.
Presented on Monday, November 9, this vehicle, created by Cegelec Défense, is already making people envious. Hospitals, regional health agencies have contacted me,
continues Vincent Bounes. Toulouse is fairly advanced in disaster responses, since AZF in 2001 or the terrorist Mohammed Merah in 2012.
This white truck is only a prototype for the moment. In the future, those that follow are expected to cost between € 500,000 and € 600,000. A fairly modest investment for such a concentration of technologies.
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