Latvia's health sector to tighten public–private cooperation for crisis readiness

Latvia's Emergency Medical Service (NMPD) and VADDA, an association of private healthcare providers, have signed an agreement on closer cooperation in crisis and disaster situations. The aim is to ensure that in an emergency, all available resources in both the public and private sectors can be quickly identified and used in a coordinated way.

What data will be shared

The agreement provides for systematic and timely exchange of information on the healthcare resources of the association's members. Regular updates will cover medical staff capacity, inpatient and outpatient services, bed capacity, diagnostic and laboratory capabilities, medical devices, equipment, materials and transport. In a crisis, this information is to be updated promptly.

What changes

NMPD had already mapped private providers' resources before, under the State Disaster Medicine Plan. In the new model, VADDA, which brings together more than 70 members, including private clinics, health centres and laboratories, will take on a coordinating role in the flow of information between its members and NMPD. This should speed up data exchange. The cooperation will also create a shared platform for discussing how to improve the disaster medicine system.

NMPD director Liene Cipule stresses that in crises it is decisive to quickly understand what resources are available at a given moment, and how to combine and use them more effectively. In her view, for residents this means better readiness for situations in which all possible resources must be mobilised within a short time.

Māris Rēvalds, chairman of the VADDA board, says national crisis preparedness is unthinkable without the private sector. He recalls that during the Covid-19 pandemic private providers already showed they could mobilise resources and adapt quickly.

Security context

One of NMPD's functions is to plan the disaster medicine system in Latvia, which is part of the national civil protection and national security system. The agreement implements the comprehensive state defence approach set out in the State Defence Concept, which calls for cooperation among the state, municipalities, non-governmental and private sectors to keep critical functions running during crises and threats.