The FINANCIAL — SES S.A., announced on April 11 the signature of a VSAT antenna donation agreement with FRIENDSHIP Luxembourg NGO donated by SES Techcom Services, a wholly-owned subsidiary of SES.
SES Techcom Services recently partnered with FRIENDSHIP in Bangladesh to install its state- of-the-art maritime VSAT antennas and to deploy SATMED, the satellite-based e-health platform, on three FRIENDSHIP hospital ships: ‘Lifebuoy Friendship Hospital’, ‘Emirates Friendship Hospital’ and ‘Rongdhonu Friendship Hospital’ (formerly the Rainbow Warrior II).
The antenna installed on the Emirates Friendship Hospital’ is a donation to FRIENDSHIP by SES. The newly-deployed e-health platform will enable healthcare workers on FRIENDSHIP floating hospitals to connect to doctors and gain access to medical knowledge from around the world, provide medical counselling to marginalised communities through telemedicine, provide e–learning services and efficiently manage communications across their teams, according to SES.
“Our SATMED deployment in Bangladesh is particularly notable, because the population is living in an extremely remote and inaccessible area,” said Gerhard Bethscheider, Managing Director of SES Techcom Services. “These communities are completely isolated from any kind of connectivity and we have attempted to change this by partnering with FRIENDSHIP to deploy SATMED on their hospital ships using maritime VSATs. After implementing SATMED platform tools and services, the ship hospitals – via satellite connectivity – will be able to support and facilitate work in the areas of e-care, e-learning, e-surveillance, e-health management, and digital imaging.”
“This partnership is a great illustration of how satellite technology can benefit humanitarian initiatives,” said Marc Elvinger, Chairman of FRIENDSHIP Luxembourg. “With FRIENDSHIP’s innovative healthcare model and the SATMED connectivity, patients can now be remotely diagnosed by experts thousands of miles away, and doctors and nurses can improve their knowledge through online courses or life sessions. Lives can be saved and changed through easy access to necessary information available anywhere via the internet.”
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