Olivia PowellLife4Life-C19 is a newly-launched association of live communication experts which offers governmental and private organisations as well as NGOs a focal point in the fight against Covid-19 pandemic.
This help includes everything from the construction of building structures such as room dividers, patient rooms or test centers, to planning expertise such as logistical processes or water and electricity supply.
Live4Life-C19 began at the Javits Center in New York, after the conference center had to be transformed into a hospital within just a few days. Initially, simple structures such as partitions and waiting rooms were required, but this quickly developed into a demand for sterile and certified hospital facilities.
The initiative was founded by the three American companies Czarnowski, Exploring and Georg P. Johnson. In the meantime, the live event coalition has grown to over 80 companies, which are working together closely.
Dave Walens, CEO of Exploring, said: “The idea of converting empty convention centers into temporary hospitals was born within a few days. Every leader we contacted agreed to join this coalition without hesitation.
“Competitors came together as partners to meet this extraordinary need. This industry is predestined to do that and make it possible.”
The basic idea of globalization, this is the challenge that IFES, International Federation of Exhibition and Event Services, has taken up and expanded the network from a national idea to a global alliance.
IFES Managing Director, Uta Goretzky, said: “As a ‘global collaboration network’, the members of IFES are used to international cooperation across national and cultural borders, and fighting the pandemic is not only a matter of the heart for all of us. Unless the virus can be contained globally and human lives saved, there will be no return to normal trade relations, which are the basis for economic recovery. If the virus rages, there will hardly be any personal contacts at the economic level, for which trade fairs are a key function.”
Torsten Heinze, managing director of the German Czarnowski, coordinated the adaptation of the American concept to a global platform as an IFES board member.
Heinze said: “In Europe, we are already quite far in most countries in the provision of additional health care facilities, but regions such as Africa or India are still at the beginning of the pandemic control in many places. Now it is our task to form the partner network, in which also companies that are not IFES members are welcome. The decisive factors here are rather the competence and the desire to help.”