Longyearbyen Hospital in Norway is located just 800 miles from the North Pole, deep inside the Arctic Circle. In a place where the average highs are only in the 40s during the height of summer and where the sun isn’t visible from October through March, physicians have to be prepared for different kinds of incidents—like polar bear attacks.
“It’s easy to hurt oneself,” John Aksel Bilicz, the hospital’s manager and head nurse, told STAT News. “We have polar bears and sometimes they even come into town, so we have to carry a weapon as ice bear protection.”
Established as part of a mining operation in 1906, the hospital now serves a community of about 2,000 people more based around scientific research and tourism.
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John joined TriMed in 2016, focusing on healthcare policy and regulation. After graduating from Columbia College Chicago, he worked at FM News Chicago and Rivet News Radio, and worked on the state government and politics beat for the Illinois Radio Network. Outside of work, you may find him adding to his never-ending graphic novel collection.