ANKARA
Air ambulances of Turkish Ministry of Health carried 69 patients from 23 countries last year while Trinidad-Tobago has been the farthest destination from where patients were brought to Turkey after 12 thousand kilometers of flight.
Emergency health services have improved extremely in Turkey, said Ministry of Health Emergency Health Services General Manager Ali Coskun. Patients and wounded people can be carried to Turkey from abroad as well as transporting patients from one country to another. Coskun stated that patients were carried by air ambulances in many countries from England to Sweden, from the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) to Trinidad-Tobago last year.
"We can carry two patients with three ambulances in each and 4 patients with one ambulance. Three of our aircraft have a range of 3000 kilometers and the other can fly longer distance," said Coskun.
There are Turkish citizens living in different parts of the world. Turkish government sends air ambulances to transfer the Turks to Turkey without charging any fee if they can not be cured in the countries where they live, said Coskun.
Coskun said the number of patients increased during Hajj. Most patients are carried to Turkey from Saudi Arabia due to intensity during Hajj.
"One of the cases that affected me most was a patient who was carried in a 35-hour flight from Trinidad-Tobago which is 12 thousand kilometers away from Turkey. We did not know this person at all. He came to visit me one year after his treatment and we get acquainted. He told me he would have never thought that a patient could be carried from that far," said Coskun.
Below are the numbers of patients carried by air ambulances of Turkey's Ministry of Health to Turkey from abroad;
-Sweden (Stockholm) :1
-Uganda (Kampala) :1
-England: 1
-France: 1
-Greece (Araxds): 1
-Albania (Tiran): 1
-Trinidad-Tobago: 1
-Saudi Arabia (Jeddah) : 1
-Saudi Arabia (Medina): 5
-Kosovo : 4
-Iraq (Irbil): 7
-Libya (Tripoli): 3
-Egypt: 3
-Germany (Frankfurt) :1
-Kazakhstan :1
-Somalia : (Djibouti):1
-Jordan (Amman) :2
-Russia (Moscow) : 3
-TRNC (Lefkosa) : 2
-Azerbaijan (Baku): 2
-Afghanistan (Mazar a Sharif): 1
-Afghanistan (Kabul) : 1
-Iran (Tabriz): 1
-Kenya: 2
