Maritime First Nations Communities

The Scenario

The 2009 flu pandemic was a global outbreak of a new strain of H1N1 influenza virus, often referred to as “swine flu”. With the potential danger of this outbreak there had to be mass amounts of vaccine produced and distributed across the country in a very short period of time.

The Challenge

Remote and isolated First Nations communities, have higher than the national average incidence of underlying chronic medical conditions, putting them at increased risk of severe illness from H1N1 infection. Some of these communities face other public health challenges, such as overcrowding, that may increase the opportunity for H1N1 Flu Virus to spread.

A further concern for people living in remote areas is that if someone does have an adverse reaction from the H1N1 Flu Virus, it may take some time to be transported to a hospital should they need hospitalization. This is especially true for fly-in communities, which is why getting a vaccine is highly recommended for all people in remote communities.

With Limited supply of the vaccine to each area/clinic there was no room for error and there had to be additional precautions taken to insure there would be no loss of vaccination do to uncontrolled situations such as power loss.

The challenge here was to provide a power backup for the vaccine fridges to ride-through potential long term power outages.

The Solution

Reliable Power was selected to supply model MP2000 dual conversion on-line UPS systems rated 2000VA/1400W complete with external batteries modules providing up to 24 hours runtime in the event of power loss.

Summary

Throughout the Fall and Winter a roll out of this UPS and Batteries were installed in various First Nations communities in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick & Newfoundland including; Burnt Church, Eel River Bar, Indian Brook, Paq’tnkek, Saint Mary’s, Sheshatshui Innu, and We’koqma’q which now allows the heath centres to maintain a safe supply of the flu vaccine for up to 24 hours during a power outage.

Source : Reliable Power

Call Toll-Free: 1-800-533-1337

Email: info@reliablepower.ca