When struck by an infectious pandemic like SARS, swine flu, MERS or Ebola, health officials in dozens of countries turn to the Israeli company Beth-El Industries for its IsoArk biological isolation units, reported Israel21c Wednesday.
The line was first developed in response to a request from the Israeli Ministry of Health in 2002, during the SARS pandemic. When the Ebola virus pandemic erupted in 2014, Beth-El’s isolation systems were ready to be deployed in hospitals, airports and field hospitals in Africa and elsewhere.
In 2014, the Spanish air force used a stretcher-based IsoArk unit to airlift Miguel Pajares, a 75-year-old Spanish missionary priest who was infected with Ebola while aiding patients in Africa, to Madrid from Liberia. The product was specially designed to withstand the possibility of rapid loss of cabin pressure en route.
Working with the Israeli Health Ministry’s emergency preparedness team, Beth-El also customized an Ebola containment tent for patients who must be kept quarantined for long periods. The extra-large tent includes a shower, sink and toilet, and is kept in the underground emergency hospital at Rambam Medical Center in Haifa.
Making a mockery of the boycott movement against Israel, Beth-El Industries is a key supplier to many NATO and other armies and NGOs.
In Italy, Israel21c further reported, the International Red Cross asked Beth-El to devise an IsoArk isolation ambulance for transporting groups of migrants suspected of having contagious diseases.
The German military deploys IsoArk tents when soldiers contract an infectious disease overseas, to enable treatment on site while safely quarantined.
The Israeli NGO Eye From Zion, which provides free cataract surgeries in countries such as Nepal, Vietnam, Myanmar, Kenya and Ethiopia, worked with Beth-El to customize an IsoArk tent as a Mobile Operating Room (MOR).
Guy Zymann, Beth-El Industries’ regional sales and marketing manager for Southeast Asia, said Beth-El’s mobile isolation units’ cost is “significantly lower” than that of stationary isolation units.
Beth-El Industries was founded by an unusual German Protestant cooperative community in Zihron Yaakov, south of Haifa. It is one of six companies in the Beth-El Group, which employs about 1,200 employees. The community was founded in 1963 by a German nurse and now reportedly numbers about 800 people.
