In mid-October, we carried out an emergency drill in Kriftel, Hesse. The scenario began with a severe earthquake. As the drinking water system also collapsed as a result, this led to an outbreak of cholera; in the drill scenario, there were 30 cases. Cholera has been a concern for the German Emergency Medical Teams for some time. Together, they are setting up a cholera unit with up to five treatment stations; an initial training session on this took place in November 2025 in Oestrich-Winkel, Hesse.
In Kriftel, alongside us, there were four other German Emergency Medical Teams (EMTs) from the WHO, as well as a team from ASB Austria and a medevac team from Lviv in Ukraine. EMTs relieve the pressure on local healthcare systems following disasters or during disease outbreaks. The WHO classifies them according to uniform standards so that the quality of treatment and the teams’ self-sufficiency can be verified. The EMT initiative dates back to the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, after which many teams were operating in the country without coordination or quality control. This coordination was also the focus in Kriftel. The units worked together at the Robert Koch Institute’s focal point. The RKI is home to the German National Focal Point for EMTs, which coordinates deployments and supports the teams through the WHO classification process.
For the first time, our dental team also took part in an exercise of this kind. Over the course of two days, more than 200 patients (who were, of course, playing the part of emergency patients) were treated. The individual treatments were only a minor aspect of the exercise. The focus was on collaboration across organisational boundaries.