- Title: Hospital uses "every resource" for victims of New Zealand volcano eruption
- Date: 12th December 2019
- Summary: WHATAKANE, NEW ZEALAND (DECEMBER 12, 2019) (REUTERS) STAFF OF WHATAKANE HOSPITAL WALKING OUT FOR NEWS CONFERENCE (SOUNDBITE) (English) WHATAKANE HOSPITAL CLINICAL LEADER, HEIKE HUNDEMER, SAYING: "Normally on a typical day, our emergency department we would have about six nurses and two doctors on duty. On Monday, once we knew the extend and severity of the casualties, I think there would have been about a hundred staff in our emergency department, acute care unit and theatres. We used every single bedspace, every resource we had to care for those people." WHITE FLASH (SOUNDBITE) (English) WHATAKANE HOSPITAL CLINICAL LEADER, HEIKE HUNDEMER, SAYING: "To put things in perspective, if we saw one patient with the severity of burns that we treated that day, this would have been a significant event for our small hospital and would have activated our trauma team. Monday is beyond anything we would have anticipated. I've work in major centres in Germany as well as in New Zealand, I've never seen this number of critically-injured patients coming into an emergency department in a short space of time." HOSPITAL SIGN (SOUNDBITE) (English) WHATAKANE HOSPITAL COORDINATOR AND DUTY NURSE MANAGER, DAVID VAN DIJK, SAYING: "What I experienced three days ago was devastating, at the heart of our hospital are our people. They all rose to the needs of our community and work beyond what anyone would expect of them. The entire hospital was involved in responding to the tragic event that we were faced with." WHITE FLASH (SOUNDBITE) (English) WHATAKANE HOSPITAL COORDINATOR AND DUTY NURSE MANAGER, DAVID VAN DIJK, SAYING: "For many of us, it feels surreal, everyone deals with tragic events in their own way and many of those are still coming to terms with what happened. Our thoughts are with the victims who remain in hospital, those that sadly didn't survive and their families and their friends. NEWS CONFERENCE ENDING
- Embargoed: 26th December 2019 04:41
- Keywords: White Island eruption hospital victims volcano
- Location: WHATAKANE, NEW ZEALAND
- City: WHATAKANE, NEW ZEALAND
- Country: New Zealand
- Topics: Disaster/Accidents,Earthquakes/Volcanoes/Tsunami
- Reuters ID: LVA001B9O4X1J
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: Representatives from Whakatane Hospital said on Thursday (December 12) that they used "every resource" to treat the victims of the volcano eruption this week as they recount the situation as "beyond anything we would have anticipated".
Speaking to reporters, clinical leader at Whatakane Hospital, Heike Hundemer said, "once we knew the extend and severity of the casualties, I think there would have been about a hundred staff in our emergency department, acute care unit and theatres."
Many of the victims of the eruption on White Island on Monday (December 9) were initially transported at Whakatane Hospital which was nearest to the site.
The death toll from the disaster has climbed to eight on Thursday, with two people dying in hospital. An additional eight victims were presumed dead on island. More than 20 people are in intensive care suffering severe burns.
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