A SAMU Social is a

municipal A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the go ...

humanitarian emergency service in several cities in

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

and worldwide whose purpose is to provide care and medical ambulatory aid and nursing to homeless people and people in social distress. This is partially accomplished via mobile units which distribute food, hot drinks, blankets, etc. Its nickname has been not well accepted because it bears confusion with a SAMU (Service d'Aide Médicale Urgente), which is an ambulance service. The SAMU Social de Paris lists the following goals as its mission: * At night: mobile assistance teams * 24-hour management of the 1-1-5

emergency telephone number Most public switched telephone networks have a single emergency telephone number (sometimes known as the universal emergency telephone number or the emergency services number) that allows a caller to contact local emergency services for assis ...

for Homeless people alert. * 24-hour emergency shelters with nursing care * During the day: reception at the "Solidarity-Insertion-Centre" * Increase the scientific knowledge of impoverished populations, from precarious situations to total exclusion, by identifying and analysing the sanitary and social problematic * Observing the phenomenon of wanderings, by establishing a typology of populations, tracking their paths and monitoring the social indicators The name comes from SAMU ( ''service d'aide médicale urgente'', "emergency medical assistance service") which in reality and by law is the French Medical Regulation of Emergencies Center based in Hospitals and which role is to regulate the medical Emergency Fluxes of demands Medicosanitary Regulation of Emergencies of a Public Health Integrated Emergency Medical System (IEMS) ; the

acronym An acronym is a word or name formed from the initial components of a longer name or phrase. Acronyms are usually formed from the initial letters of words, as in ''NATO'' (''North Atlantic Treaty Organization''), but sometimes use syllables, as ...

has become a kind of popular informal word, synonym to emergency action because it is the mark labelling Mobile Intensive Care Unit Ambulances in France. A new origin was proposed to this acronym as used in this appellation : '' service ambulatoire d'urgences '' because conflictual with the SAMU that is woldwild an official Puvblic Service appellation and because it is neither a Medical Emergency Service nor a true “Social Emergency Service”. On July 19, 2011, Xavier Emmanuelli resigned from the presidency following the State's announcement of drastic reductions in the resources allocated to emergency accommodation. However, he will continue his action at the Samu social International. This decision will be followed by a strike by social emergency professionals on August 2, 2011.

References

External links

* (Paris)
SAMU Social de Marseilles

SAMU Social de Bruxelles

SAMU Social de Moscou

SAMU Social International
{{Authority control Homelessness organizations Medical and health organizations based in France Organizations established in 1993