Meeting the Challenges of a Pandemic

IDEaS adapting to meet the needs of a global crisis

The COVID-19 pandemic shifted everything: priorities, work, families, and lives. Within DND/CAF, troops were deployed in new and unanticipated ways including assisting in long-term care facilities, distributing PPE and helping with contact tracing efforts.

IDEaS was no exception. The program adjusted its plans and work to accommodate a new reality. In-person events went virtual and new teams were assembled as new challenges presented themselves.

Soon after the pandemic started, the program was asked to pivot some of its resources to work with Health Canada and the Public Health Agency of Canada to assist in the Pan-Government Response. A tiger team was put together to develop COVID-19 specific challenges with a defence capability focus.

The challenge process started by asking two questions question. How might we recognize, prevent and detect moral trauma among frontline staff? What are some novel ways to re-use COVID-19 protective gear or clean equipment and workspaces?

The innovation challenges that IDEaS presents to Canadian innovators are real world scenarios and problems facing clients across the entire DND/CAF. The pandemic brought pressing and important questions being faced by the DND/CAF that were tackled immediately, leading to the identification and issuance of four challenges related to COVID-19.

For example, the pandemic revealed shortcomings in the availability and type of PPE to protect against biological agents used by military personnel and First Responders as well as the ability of PPE and operational clothing and equipment to sustain repeated and rapid disinfection. The resulting “Scrubbing your scrubs” challenge invited solutions for rapid and effective decontamination of PPE, allowing to re-use COVID-19 protective gear. We were looking for innovative material and design solutions, as well as rapid and effective decontamination strategies and solutions for PPE, operational clothing and equipment for personnel responding to events involving biological hazards.

The Competitive Projects team worked hard to issue this particular Call for Proposals (CFP) and manage the process of reviewing the proposals and determining which projects would receive funding.