"Medical devices cost a lot of money, but the peace of mind they provide is priceless."

Medical assistance is essential during a human tower performance to assist the castellers in the event of a fall. If there is no medical assistance in place, the day must be halted or canceled. Achieving good organization among city councils, groups, and professionals is not easy, and in this regard, the Parliament has approved a proposed resolution to improve medical assistance for human tower performances.

Tarragona was a pioneering city in 2013 by establishing a protocol managed by the City Council, the Red Cross, and the Santa Tecla Network. "Our job is for the castellers to do their job, which is to build human towers; we'll take care of everything else," explains Ester Roca, Culture and Festivals Specialist at the City Council.

Thus, she states that one of the main objectives is to try to ensure the performance never stops, and for this to happen, organization is necessary: "Medical assistance costs a lot of money, but the peace of mind they give us is priceless," she states. In large operations there may be up to 40 health workers on the scene, including Civil Protection and specialists such as a pediatrician or an X-ray technician.

Field hospitals

An element established as vital for maximum response efforts are field hospitals. These can have up to eight beds, where treatment is primarily provided for minor injuries that do not require referral to hospital. Their purpose, moreover, is to avoid overloading ambulances or ensuring they do not have to leave, allowing the response to continue. These field hospitals cost only 80 euros, and the benefit to the response is significant.

Each group also has a medical officer, and until they request intervention, the unit does not enter the arena. Roca enlists the groups' help at this point. He says they have sometimes taken human tower builders to the hospital and have left within half an hour, and the response could have been resolved with on-site treatment without having to send ambulances. Thus, he emphasizes that "it's very important not so much to provide more vehicles, but rather the educational activities you can provide, before and afterward." However, he asserts that in serious accidents, the ambulance has left and that the health of the human tower builders is the priority.

On the other hand, he comments that "it often happens that before any human tower falls, we treat more people for heat exhaustion than human tower builders."

The Parliament's proposal

Recently, a proposal promoted by Junts and ERC and approved by the Parliament urges the Government to improve healthcare for human tower projects. This proposal, in part, stems fromThe serious fall of a girl from the Colla Vella de los Ninos de Valls on the Day of Sant Fèlix Last summer, the initial contacts between the Coordinator of Human Tower Groups of Catalonia and Jordi Bertran—a Junts MP and expert in the world of human towers—were also passed on to Raquel Sans—an ERC MP and human tower builder for the Joves de Valls (Young People's Party of Catalonia).

Sans explains that the main objective of the proposal is to have a defined protocol so that everyone knows what to do, as is already the case with other activities such as correfocs (firework runs). "There was goodwill in the case of human tower groups, but it wasn't written down or regulated," she states.

The proposal details the type of medical equipment required depending on the number of groups and whether maximum numbers of human towers are planned. Other planned measures include cooperation with the Coordinator to improve security features, investment in safety measures at the groups' premises, and the installation of automatic defibrillators.