Air ambulances will reach the farthest point in between 20 and 30 minutes, which will meet the "golden hour" requirement for rescuing victims, said Transport and Communications Minister Georgi Gvozdeikov at a press conference dedicated to the implementation of the governance programme of the Council of Ministers.
"We have unblocked the process of developing emergency medical services by air. We gave the Ministry of Health the opportunity to work hard on launching a public procurement for the construction of the operational bases," Gvozdeikov said.
He assured that according to the initially set timeline, the first helicopter will be here in December and efforts will be made to put it into operation as early as January 2024.
Minister Gvozdeikov said that so far the sites where the operational bases will be built have been identified, and the necessary terrain has already been cleared for four of them. Government decisions have secured sites at Sofia and Plovdiv airports, as well as at the former Targovishte airport. There will also be a base at Sliven airport.
The other two points will be at Dolna Mitropolia airport and Gabrovnitsa airport, where there is a former air base which is currently no longer needed, Minister Gvozdeikov explained. He added that work is underway to transfer the property there from the Ministry of Defence to the Ministry of Health, so that construction of the adjacent infrastructure can begin.
The air ambulance system in Bulgaria will be built according to European rules, the Transport and Communications Minister assured.
Earlier, Prime Minister Nikolay Denkov told the press conference that the caretaker government has made a mistake in situating the operational sites for medical helicopters.
"They cannot be in hospitals, as was the plan of the caretaker government. They have no right to be there. They can land there only when there is a need to carry out the relevant medical activity. We have to restart the process," Denkov explained.
"There is a European regulation that requires this activity to be carried out by commercial companies. What the caretaker government has done is to close the commercial company and transfer the activity to the State Aviation Operator (SAO), which is not allowed to carry out this activity. Now, one year later, we find ourselves in a baseline situation where the SAO cannot carry out this activity. We have to set up a commercial company again to take over this work," Denkov said.
The Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Transport and Communications are working together to solve all the problems related to providing air assistance to Bulgarian citizens.
According to Transport and Communications Minister Georgi Gvozdeikov, the first medical helicopter will be delivered to the country in December this year and there will be no delays in the implementation of the project.
/DD/
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