"Eric Bonvin, general director of the regional hospital in Sion, admitted that they were already very busy before the Crans-Montana bar disaster, in the third press briefing from Sion on Friday. "For emergencies, for us, this moment is a time of very high activity that we had reinforced, particularly with the help of the department, for this holiday period. It you should know that there is almost a doubling of the Balezan population during that period, and for emergency services, it is obviously important. So during that night, the night of the tragedy, you should know that the emergency centre was already in full activity," he said. "So there is there was both the influx of injured from the drama in Crans, and at the same time also the injured, I want to say ordinary, but it’s not just any injured, but ordinary, the usual injured that we have in these situations. So we had to distribute things a bit," he explained. 40 people have been confirmed dead and 119 injured, of many different nationalities. The blaze broke out in the early hours of New Year's Day at the La Constellation bar. Eyewitnesses and online videos suggested sparklers on champagne bottles had ignited the ceiling. The venue was packed with young people celebrating. "