It was also wartime, which meant that research funds were scarce, equipment difficult to get hold of, and air raids a constant threat.
According to one senior officer, the Tuareg commanders of three of the four Malian units fighting in the north at the time defected to the insurrection "at the crucial moment," taking fighters, weapons and scarce equipment with them.
"Onshore in North America, which has seen a marked increase in rig activity over the previous 12 to 18 months, there is scarce available equipment, and we see day rates having more room for growth than utilization.
According to former heroin addicts interviewed in Yunnan in 2002, novice opium addicts soon switch to injecting heroin so the police cannot smell fumes from their activities; by 2002 HIV was infecting around half of local injectors according to local government statistics, due to sharing of scarce injecting equipment.
Despite the militarisation of the population, the Albanian defence system was massively inefficient and took little account of the country's real defence needs; training was minimal, fuel and ammunition were scarce, uniforms and equipment were of poor quality, weapons were antiquated and the military lacked a proper command and control system.
In many of the high volume hospitals we visited in Yemen, equipment was scarce.
Showmanship, in this region where military skill and equipment are scarce, played an easy and effective part in the British effort.
Dr. Verghese trained before M.R.I. or CT existed, in Ethiopia and India, where fancy equipment was scarce and good examination skills were a matter of necessity and pride.
In the Korean War, Ms. Gritsavage revolutionized the command structure of the Army Nursing Corps, obtaining hospital supplies when equipment was scarce and helping get the military to commission male nurses on an equal footing with women.
However, the availability of innovative 3D biomanufacturing technologies for hard tissue and organ engineering is scarce and with several equipment limitations.
Clinicians providing emergency care are not comfortable if they have not had formal training in emergency services and are not confident in their skills toward some procedures, and they have to do their job in an environment with poorly functioning equipment and scarce medications.
