Chinese Navy hospital ship to make first visit to Dominica

Source
stlucianewsonline.com
Editor
Li Jiayao
Time
2018-10-03 22:56:23

Source: stlucianewsonline.com

The Chinese navy hospital ship Ark Peace will visit Dominica on October 12 through 19.

This will be the first time for Ark Peace to visit Dominica which is the 39th country to be visited.

During the visit, the mission commanders will pay courtesy calls on the senior government officials of Dominica. Hospital ship Ark Peace will offer free medical services to the local people and staff of Chinese-funded institutions, including exchange activities, such as medical training, public ship tour and cultural entertainment.

Ark Peace set sail from Zhoushan, China on June 28 to carry out Mission Harmony – 2018.

Dominica is the 7th stop of the current mission.

This mission is the concrete practice of carrying forward international humanitarianism and disseminating the idea of peace, development, cooperation and win-win as well, which will be conducive to enhance the friendly relationship between China and Dominica and the two peoples as well.

The Chinese navy hospital ship Ark Peace is a large maritime medical platform designed and built in China. She was commissioned in December 2008 with pennant number 866. The ship boasts a length of 178 meters, a beam of 24 meters and an air draught of 35.5 meters.

She is in possession of 8 levels and a full displacement of 14,300 tons. The 4,000㎡ hospital ship is separated into five main areas respectively for casualty transfer, triage, outpatient, inpatient and evacuation.

Over the past 10 years since she was commissioned, Ark Peace has sailed altogether 215,000 nautical miles, visited 38 countries and provided medical services for more than 200,000 people, therefore, she has opened a window for the world to learn about China and is commended as a vivid name card of China in the new era.

1. What does the hospital ship’s name signify?

Ark Peace is a ship of peace, a ship of life and a ship of friendship as well.

2. What are the major tasks of the hospital ship?

Ark Peace primarily assumes the missions of treating and transferring the casualty at sea during wartime, and during peacetime, carrying out international humanitarian medical services, providing emergency medical rescue in the event of major disasters, conducting military medical exchanges and cooperation with foreign countries as well as offering medical services to inhabitants and military personnel on islands. Thus the ship has been praised as the Ark of Life.

3. What are the features of the hospital ship?

Ark Peace is characterized by five items as follow.

First, outstanding ocean-going rescue capability: Ark Peace has outstanding seaworthiness and maneuverability with an endurance of 30 days and nights, 12-grade wind-proof capability and maximum speed of 20 knots. She boasts great ocean-going capability and is capable of conducting difficult surgical operations at rough sea.

Second, diversified methods of casualty transfer: Ark Peace is equipped with two landing craft, two high-speed craft and six enclosed lifeboats. She has flexible transfer capabilities by means of helicopter, hanging basket, gangway and alongside transfer gear as well, which ensure that the sick and wounded can be effectively and expeditiously received, transferred and evacuated.

Third, fully-equipped medical facilities: Ark Peace boasts 8 clean operating rooms, 300 sickbeds, 7 medical staff offices, 8 nurse stations and 18 consulting rooms, including severe burn wards, ICU, DR room, CT room, dental clinic, special examination room, blood preparation room as well as laboratory and medical information center, etc. with 249 types of medical devices (a total of 2,666 sets), meeting the requirements of being advanced and practical.

Fourth, advanced supporting systems: With the help of telemedicine system, medical LAN system and video monitoring system, medical staff are able to perform sophisticated surgical operation at sea.

The medical area adopts a separate clean air conditioning system. The medical waste and sewage disposal system can incinerate and pack solid wastes, filter and purify medical sewage to meet the requirements of the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution of the Sea.

Fifth, capable medical staff: Medical staff are arranged as per different missions, covering surgery, internal medicine, gynecology, ophthalmology, otolaryngology, stomatology and traditional Chinese medicine as well. All doctors, who are in possession of attending physician qualification and abundant clinical experiences, are from the teaching hospitals affiliated to Naval Medical University of the Chinese navy.

4. Where is the home port of the hospital ship?

It is located in Zhoushan, Zhejiang Province in China.

5. How many times has the hospital ship carried out Mission Harmony?

This is the 7th time for Ark Peace to carry out Mission Harmony medical services. Previously, she has ever been to 5 countries in Asia and Africa in 2010, 4 countries in Latin America in 2011, 8 countries in Asia in 2013, 4 countries in the South Pacific in 2014 as well as 8 countries in the rim of the Pacific in 2015 and 8 countries in Asia and Africa in 2017 for visit and medical services.

6. How will the hospital ship provide gratis medical services?

Ark Peace will offer gratis consultation and treatment (including diagnosis, examination, surgical operation, inpatient as well as medicine and food) to local people onboard the hospital ship as the major platform. In the meantime, several on-site medical teams will be dispatched to both military and civilian hospitals, barracks, schools, communities, villages, orphanages and homes for the elders as well for free medical services, so as to benefit more local people.

Disclaimer: This article was originally produced and published by stlucianewsonline.com. View the original article at stlucianewsonline.com.

 

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