Four members of LSTM’s Well Travelled Clinics (WTC) spent four very long days in York last week preparing a group of new NHS volunteers travelling to West Africa to fight the Ebola virus.
The 34 humanitarian aid workers were taking part in a nine day pre-deployment training programme at the Army Medical Services Training Centre in York before being deployed to Sierra Leone next weekend. Philippa Tubb, WTC’s Managing Director, along with a nurse and two doctors from the clinic, travelled to the Centre to set up and run a special off site clinic.
They worked between 7.30am and 10.00pm every day, seeing the volunteers between their training sessions at the Centre, with one of the army training tents becoming their makeshift clinic under canvas for the four day trip.
Philippa Tubb said: “The team of four from the WTC worked more than 12 hours each day carrying out medicals, psychological reviews, vaccinations and giving out anti malarials, so that the aid workers would be ready for deployment as soon as the programme was finished. They will be working hard in very difficult conditions in Sierra Leone so it is vital to make sure that they are as prepared as possible for what they will face. It was a long four days, but important for the team and we wish them a safe and successful deployment.”