Bilateral strategic partnership between Canadian Red Cross and Bulgarian Red Cross

Bilateral strategic partnership between the Canadian Red Cross (CRC) and the Bulgarian Red Cross (BRC) aims to exchange experience and technical knowledge between the two National Societies (NCs) in order to increase the BRC's capacity for prevention and response to extreme public health situations. Sharing of knowledge and experience will be carried out on the basis of an analysis of the needs of the BRC, through joint meetings, trainings of the members of the MHUs on jointly developed specific modules, procedures (SOPs) and rules, exchange of materials and academic partnerships that will contribute to expansion of knowledge and skills for BRC’s prevention and response activities.
The program includes the exchange of technical knowledge, provision of priority equipment for the teams, etc.
Within the framework of a three-year partnership program, a total of 10 mobile health units (MHUs) are planned to be built - 2 in the city of Sofia (1 MHU within the National Team for Disaster and Crisis Situations of the BRC and 1 EHU within the Capital branch) and 8 MHUs to the BRC’s branches in Burgas, Blagoevgrad, Varna, Vratsa, Dobrich, Plovdiv, Ruse and Kardzhali.
The Mobile Health Teams (MHUs) will be built and prepared in order to expand the capacity of the National Society to respond to situations with risk to health such as epidemics, refugee influx and emerging health risks in disasters.
They will be trained to carry out activities related to prevention, guidance and assistance to those affected by disasters and crises. If needed, they support the activities of state institutions and local structures (of MoH - Regional Health Inspectorates, GD "Fire protection", etc.) and coordinate their actions with them, they will support the general actions of the voluntary teams of the BRC and will participate in the training exercises with BRC’s partners.