Ministry of Health (23.04.2020) TRAINING OF VOLUNTEERS ON BASIC FRONTLINE RESPONDERS FOR COVID-19
As a part of the preparedness plan for the Worst Case COVID-19 situations, the Ministry of Health has been working on mapping out vulnerable populations, resources, and human resources in the country. According to the health human resource mapping, there are just over 3000 health personnel in the country. Should the country enter into the Red-Stage Plus, these 3000 plus health personnel will be, more or less, involved in clinical management of severe COVID-19 cases in the isolation of hospitals and other regular patients across the country.
Therefore, it is expected that there will be more demand for health professionals to manage the cases. In such a case, as deemed appropriate, on command of His Majesty the King, the Ministry of Health has planned to train around 300 volunteers from the Civil Service, Desuung and HOPE Volunteers as the Basic Frontline Responders for the COVID-19 situations.
The Ministry of Health has planned to train around 300 volunteers from the Civil Service, Desuung and HOPE Volunteers as the Basic Frontline Responders for the COVID-19 situations. This group will be responsible for managing asymptomatic and mild COVID-19 cases in the country. For this, a 6-day training curriculum has been developed and finalized by the Khesar Gyalpo University of Medical Sciences of Bhutan (KGUMSB) in collaboration with the Ministry of Health and endorsed by the Bhutan Medical and Health Council, and Technical Advisory Group for COVID-19 of the Ministry of Health.
TRAINING OF VOLUNTEERS ON BASIC FRONTLINE RESPONDERS FOR COVID-19
By ICT / 23/04/2020
The COVID-19 has been declared as pandemic since early March 2020 after affecting over 200 countries around the world. Bhutan saw its first COVID-19 positive case on 6th March and since then 7 cases have been detected as of 23rd April 2020.
As a part of the preparedness plan for the Worst Case COVID-19 situations, the Ministry of Health has been working on mapping out vulnerable populations, resources, and human resources in the country. According to the health human resource mapping, there are just over 3000 health personnel in the country. Should the country enter into the Red-Stage Plus, these 3000 plus health personnel will be, more or less, involved in clinical management of severe COVID-19 cases in the isolation of hospitals and other regular patients across the country.
Therefore, it is expected that there will be more demand for health professionals to manage the cases. In such a case, as deemed appropriate, on command of His Majesty the King, the Ministry of Health has planned to train around 300 volunteers from the Civil Service, Desuung and HOPE Volunteers as the Basic Frontline Responders for the COVID-19 situations. This group will be responsible for managing asymptomatic and mild COVID-19 cases in the country. For this, a 6-day training curriculum has been developed and finalized by the Khesar Gyalpo University of Medical Sciences of Bhutan (KGUMSB) in collaboration with the Ministry of Health and endorsed by the Bhutan Medical and Health Council, and Technical Advisory Group for COVID-19 of the Ministry of Health.
Encouragingly, the Ministry of Health received an overwhelming number of volunteers through the support of the Desuung Office, Royal Civil Service Commission, and HOPE Volunteers. Out of the many, the Ministry has selected about 337 volunteers based on the stringent criteria in view of the demanding COVID-19 situations. The volunteers come from various backgrounds and different Dzongkhags. They will undergo a 6-day long training program on Basic Frontline Responders for COVID-19 and will be deployed in the event Bhutan enters the Red-Stage Plus of Global COVID-19 situations in the country.
The training is scheduled in four locations namely, Thimphu, Mongar, Phuentsholing and Gelephu as below: