[1] The task force was composed of volunteer Swiss members of the Disaster Relief Unit and international specialists, equipped with the latest chemical and biological protection equipment, immunized against agents suspected for battlefield use and had its own jet transportation.
The task of the force was to arrive on reportedly contaminated land, assess the risk to the civilian population, respond to it and coordinate the response by other international relief agencies, telling them when it would be safe to send in their personnel.
Task Force Scorpio was under the orders of the Secretary-General of the United Nations, and was ready for active duty on the 28 February 1991, in time for the first Gulf War.
The Task force was founded by Dr Robert Steffen of the Institute of Social and Preventive Medicine, University of Zurich, Switzerland and co-founded by Jack Woodall, PhD, then at WHO/Geneva and leader of the WHO delegation to the Biological Weapons Convention.
In February 2016, the European Union launched a similar medical corps to respond to emergencies like the Ebola outbreak in West Africa.