Israel faces real threats today

The world’s largest fortified underground emergency hospital has been built on Rambam Health Care Campus in Haifa, and is designed to protect patients and staff against conventional and non-conventional warfare.

The Sammy Ofer Fortified Underground Emergency Hospital is a three-level, 60,000-square-meter facility that will function as a 1,500-vehicle parking lot during peacetime. The structure is fully fortified against conventional, chemical and biological warfare. It has 40-cm-thick reinforced concrete walls and ceilings. Tens of thousands of ventilation and air filtration units, equipped with carbon and HEPA filters that are 98% effective in filtering out biological and chemical agents, have been installed.

The ingenuity of the project is that in wartime, the parking lot can be transformed within a maximum of 72 hours into a sealed off, self-sufficient emergency hospital able to store enough breathable oxygen, drinking water, and medical-gas supplies for up to three days. The process for this transformation has been methodically planned—logistically and medically—by a team of experts, so that each and every detail is accounted for.

While there are other underground hospitals in the world, Rambam’s is the only facility that will be able to transfer 2,000 patients, the staff caring for them, and the necessary medical equipment underground within a period of 48–72 hours.

“The threat of war has not disappeared and has unfortunately grown stronger,” comments Professor Rafi Beyar, Director and CEO of Rambam Health Care Campus. “As the main referral hospital for Northern Israel’s over two million people, we are determined to provide acute and chronic hospital care to all those who need it, even under fire.”

Rambam faces real threats. The end-of-year giving campaign aims to fully equip and prepare the fortified underground hospital—the largest of its kind in the world—with 2,000 standard and specialized medical beds.

Rambam still urgently needs 1,750 beds to reach its goal. Your tax-deductible charitable donation to this campaign represents an expression of solidarity with Rambam Hospital and Northern Israel’s people. With your help, Rambam can realize the dream of having a complete and secure underground hospital in 2014.