The Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM), with support from the Canadian Government through the ASEAN-CANADA GPP Project, recently acquired a decontamination tent and a Patient Transport Isolation Unit (PTIU).

The decontamination tent is a pneumatic tent that can assembled by at least two persons in under five minutes. The tent is made of rugged material tested against industry standards to ensure durability on deployment. In RITM, the tent will be used to provide responders with a safe environment before admission to the hospital for treatment. This will reduce the contamination on patients who are exposed to highly pathogenic and virulent pathogens in a biological event. The tent will also ensure that the surrounding community is safe from further contamination.

The PTIU is used to safety transport individuals infected with highly pathogenic and virulent disease. The equipment can either function as a positive pressure chamber, keeping the contaminants out, or as a negative pressure chamber, keeping the contaminants inside. Whichever function it performs, the equipment provides the patient with clean air by passing the air through High-efficiency particle filters.

These are all part of the continuous effort to improve the Institute’s capacity in responding to various biological emergencies.

by Edson Simon, Science Research Specialist II