Maryland’s Howard County Department of Fire and Rescue Services has started to deploy a cleaning and disinfecting team in the emergency room at Howard County General Hospital, Johns Hopkins Medicine.
Related: Transport of COVID-19 Patients
When an ambulance arrives at the emergency room, the decontamination team cleans and disinfects the unit inside and out while the transport crew is transitioning the patient to the hospital staff.
When the crew has completed the transfer, they return to a clean restocked unit and are able to quickly return to service to answer other calls. The decontamination team will be working from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. every day to ensure emergency responders have clean EMS units available to serve.