The NATO Effort to Fight COVID-19 in Afghanistan

Rory Stuart, MD, FACEP

Midway through our Bagram deployment in early 2020, COVID-19 exploded across the globe. U.S./NATO physicians and war planners were tasked with developing a viral response plan.

We began with a series of mitigation strategies; quarantine requirement for all inbound personnel, moving high-risk individuals out, social distancing, masking, closing gyms, and suspending nonessential travel. Critical care resources were collapsed into the Role 3s in Bagram and Kandahar.

Emergency physicians would decide which individuals would be tested, quarantined, admitted, or sent to isolation. In emergency medicine, we are trained to do more with less in the service of patients who often have few good options. Our deployed emergency medicine team took this ethos and tackled the biggest military medicine and logistical problem of the last century. In recognition of our contribution to the mission, Gen. Austin Miller personally awarded our team the Bronze Star prior to our departure. 

Dr. Rory Stuart receives the Bronze Star from Gen. Austin Miller.

Be sure to read the January 2022 issue of ACEP Now for more reflections from emergency physicians who served in Afghanistan.

If you have a reflection on your experience in Afghanistan—from 9/11 to the U.S. exiting earlier this year—that you would like to share, send it to ACEPNow@acep.org