The world is going through a global health crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. It is a situation unforeseen by contemporary societies, with individual anxieties adding to the challenges facing governments and civil society. Within various sectors, such as the state, private, and non-profit sectors, in Cai et al. (2021) and Nampoothiri and Artuso (2021), several initiatives involving civil society are reported with objectives that target the general population, but that particularly impact the most vulnerable sectors of society in health or social terms.

The COVID-19 pandemic presented several challenges for organizations, requiring closures or adaptations of their business models to meet the challenges posed by the pandemic situation (Seetharaman 2020). Moreover, social organizations have reported impacts in the way they develop their activities, and they share the view that the pandemic has intensified a high set of social problems such as depression, unemployment, poverty, social inequality, and domestic violence (Gama et al. 2020; Krumer-Nevo and Refaeli 2021; Porter et al. 2021). Quantifying the impact of these problems is not consensual, but the idea has emerged that the most economically fragile and socially vulnerable countries will be the most affected. Furthermore, Wedel (2020) notes that various social actors need to think outside the box and open new paths of action that rely on social innovation.

Several organizations framed within civil society have sought to make their contribution in the sense of helping those on the front lines in the fight against COVID-19 (Arslan et al. 2022). Several projects have emerged to support society, for example, in combating social isolation, purchasing essential products, and seeking health services. These initiatives can be framed in the model proposed by Grimm et al. (2013) in which social innovation happens when the process of social entrepreneurship is successful, meaning that a new, appropriate, and creative response is found to solve a social problem. Furthermore, Almeida (2020) notes that these projects are characterized by having a strong Human2Human (H2H) component in which a humanized and close relationship is privileged. Effectively, reswearchers can assume that these projects contribute to a reconstruction of the usual environment in which human beings move and which is constituted by daily, formal, and informal interactions.

Kramer (2017) highlights the change in understanding that is taking place in recent years in terms of the relationship between organizations and their customers by using the advantages brought by communication and information technologies. Effectively, the traditional concept of the relationship established between businesses and consumers is no longer enough. A new model is emerging—the H2H—which values the humanization of the relationship between suppliers of goods and services and their customers, emphasizing people as people and investing in relationships of trust. The advantages of this approach are evident in terms of the real-time adaptation of the supply of goods and services sought by customers, i.e., the immediate adaptation to the changing needs of customers, considering the emotional component of the relationship and the benefits of structuring this relationship on a transparent basis (Kotler et al. 2021).

The approaches that have emerged in the context of understanding the exchanges between human beings within the H2H paradigm have been situated in the context of business, or exchanges involving the acquisition of goods and services for profit. RWesearchers consider the initiatives of the volunteer firefighters that will be presented as going beyond the parameters that characterize business (buying and selling) on a regular basis and for-profit since they involve components and goals related to volunteering, solidarity, welfare, humanitarianism, and non-profit purposes. However, and according to Kotler et al. (2021), there is in the H2H concept a side of exploitation of the value of frugal, everyday life, and familiarity; in short, it is proximity-based on the trust built-in to ordinary interaction, and the discovery of what human beings have in common interests reusearchers here when researcherswe address the provision of services to the needy mediated by firefighters. ResearchersWe approach the volunteer firefighters’ initiatives as enabling an interaction that is both human and reassuring, which participates in the construction of a normality of daily human interactions, and thus sediments these peacekeepers in the collective imaginary and in collective social representations, as well as their role in the national reality.

The literature has addressed the role of firefighters in combating the challenges posed by the pandemic by placing them on the front line in responding to the needs of the population (Dagyaran et al. 2021; Jecker et al. 2020). The physical and mental health consequences of these professionals have also been addressed (Graham et al. 2021; Zolnikov and Furio 2020). However, there is a research gap in that there are no studies that explore the role and initiatives promoted by volunteer firefighters in addressing the challenges caused by the pandemic. Thus, reswearchers propose to approach in this entry study the case of Portuguese volunteer firefighters, and their corporations, to present activities developed in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic by the set of corporations, including their offer of services to the community in a relationship with the population that characterizes these social organizations as “soldiers of peace”. Furthermore, it aims to explore through an ethnographic study the initiatives promoted by volunteer firefighters in Portugal that enable the realization of the H2H paradigm. The presentation of new activities in the context of a pandemic demonstrates the permanent adaptation capacity of firefighters to the challenges posed by the social environment and its relevance and proximity to the most disadvantaged population.

2. Volunteer Firefighters and the Humanization of Healthcare during the Pandemic

Howard and Strauss (1975) sought to create a conceptualization for humanization and associate its importance with health care. This approach starts from the basic premise that human beings are producers of physiological and psychological needs, and care that is concerned with providing for them can be understood as humanized. The ideological dimension is characterized by taking three guides as references for the practice of care: the intrinsic value of human life, the irreplaceability of each human being, and that people are considered in their wholeness (Howard and Strauss 1975). Recognizing the intrinsic value of human life, regardless of status or any hierarchy, also brings into focus the debate regarding the issues of equality, equity, and the discussion about access to health care. Travelbee (1971) noted that to affirm that each person is irreplaceable is to recognize that each person possesses singularities that define a unique identity. To be insensitive to this aspect would lead to routine, standardized, and impersonal treatment. However, Asadi-Lari et al. (2004) argued that standardized care is not necessarily synonymous with dehumanization, just as differentiated treatment does not mean humanized care, either. The importance of humanization in health, as recognized in the studies conducted by Fuente-Martos et al. (2018), Merenstein et al. (2016), and Todres et al. (2009), becomes more relevant when faced with an abrupt event on a global scale. The COVID-19 pandemic is configured as a crisis experience since it corresponds to an unexpected and disorganizing event that has caused physical and psychological suffering to the world population, and as it represents the interruption of the continuity of life, making human fragility evident and creating transformations in those who experience it. Hence, healthcare providers have encouraged humanization actions during the pandemic to offer a physical, social, and psychological welcome, such as activities focused on the experience of the patient and his/her family members (Carlucci et al. 2020). Professionals providing care tend to be involved in this process, as well, and act as humanization agents. The large amount of information and data that have been disseminated in the media, on the Internet, and in social networks allows citizens to have knowledge about the consequences and treatments available for COVID-19. However, this information hides the real knowledge about what it means to remain for weeks, or even months, in hospitalization, both for the patient and their family. As noted in Menzies and Menzies (2020), the still poorly understood disease, combined with the large number of deaths on a global scale, causes a sense of fear and panic not only for those who are infected, but also for those accompanying that patient. Ashana and Cox (2021) pointed out that the severity of COVID-19, coupled with the distance from family members, during the period of hospitalization for treatment can be alleviated by a humane approach undertaken by the health professionals caring for the patients. Innovative practices have been developed for these patients, such as the ICU diary that allows the physician, together with the multi-professional team, to talk to the family members and share the patient’s entire clinical picture (Haruna et al. 2021). Another practice is video calls with family members, which seeks to ease the pain of isolation and separation the patient experiences when separated from their relatives (Kennedy et al. 2021). The initiatives presented above are exclusively focused on the process of treating patients and on the relationship with their relatives. However, the humanization of health services should also include the pre-hospital phase. In this component, the role of volunteer firemen stands out as a primordial element in the relationship between the population and health services. However, the role of firefighters is much broader and includes various components of support for risk situations such as fires, floods, road accidents, accidents at work, etc. Firefighters are also required to be resourceful and quick to move, highly physically agile, and quick to react to danger. Managing the risks at hand also requires mental stamina, emotional balance, and even dispersed attention to appreciate and equate the factors present in the hazards and act accordingly (Heydari et al. 2022). The quality of interpersonal relationships to be established, whether with colleagues or with the public, especially with people in shock, requires flexibility and openness in the relationship. It is not only organizations that are influenced by these situations—the human resources within them are also influenced. One of the major influences of crisis situations on civil protection professionals is reflected in their well-being. The well-being of the security forces and professionals who are on the front line in the fight against COVID-19 are exposed to situations of great stress and psychological complexity that may in the future have repercussions on their psychological well-being (Gómez-Galán et al. 2020; Lluch et al. 2022; Martínez-López et al. 2021; Peinado and Anderson 2020). During the pandemic, volunteer firefighters have continued to be on the front lines of rescue, transporting sick people, both urgent and non-urgent, transporting people infected with COVID-19, and responding to other emergencies that arise every day. COVID-19 has raised the bar for firefighters, increasing the number of existing occupational stressors and adding complex personal and professional challenges (McAlearney et al. 2022; Pink et al. 2021). A firefighter is seen as a credible source of information, someone who should be in possession of the correct information during occurrences and that should be able to address the rescuees’ doubts and questions. However, firefighters are also victims of information overload and have a constant obligation to manage conflicting data and identify false news. This responsibility can be an additional source of stress as firefighters themselves may have doubts and uncertainties about various aspects of the pandemic.

3. The Role of Portuguese Volunteer Firefighters

In Portugal, the mission of firefighters is set out in Law No. 38/2017, which defines the legal regime applicable to Portuguese firefighters in mainland Portugal. In the regime, it is specified that a volunteer firefighter is an individual who is integrated professionally or voluntarily into a fire department and has the activity of fulfilling their missions, including the protection of human lives and property in danger, through the prevention and extinction of fires and the rescue of the injured, sick, or shipwrecked, and the provision of other services provided in the internal regulations and other applicable legislation (DL38 2017). Several studies have explored the differences between professional firefighters and volunteer firefighters, and there are significant differences in relation to their dependence on municipal government entities, organizational structure, and career development (Brunet et al. 2001; Pennington et al. 2021). Volunteer fire departments are made up of volunteer firefighters integrated into a humanitarian association. As Schmidthuber and Hilgers (2019) pointed out, volunteer firefighters are primarily motivated by helping others and contributing to a common cause. Firefighters are the frontline of the civil protection fight in an emergency and rescue, and their actions are most visible in society when fires, accidents, and/or disasters occur. Cipriano (2016) highlights that there are about 30,000 active firefighters in Portugal, of which 92% are volunteer firefighters who practice their profession in their spare time. This statistic shows that the difference in headcount between professional and volunteer firefighters is very significant. There are historical and strategic reasons that justify this large difference. In Portugal, firefighting, as an occupation, was born almost 650 years ago from associative structures that, over time, have expanded their scope of response (Cipriano 2016). This means that the country did not feel a great need to create professional firefighter structures since this associative structure responded well to the challenges posed in the country. Moreover, the financial sustainability needed to create and maintain a professional firefighter organization was another reason why the creation of more professional structures was continuously postponed (Oliveira 2016). As is recognized in the structure of civil protection in Portugal, firefighters are a fundamental component of the response to populations and are guided by an action that is mainly planned and operationalized at the municipal/local level. According to Amaro (2013), this fact raises questions about integrated responses at the national level, with a national plan or strategy to address the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, but it clearly shows a particular configuration of the relationship with the local populations of each fire department, which is a relationship of a municipal scope. In fact, consulting the civil protection operating structure ANEPC (2021), its integrated system of protection and rescue operations, and its coordination structures (SIOPS 2021) may not be very useful if rwesearchers intend to frame the actions of fire departments related to the pandemic in a concerted strategy at the national, or even district, level. The root of the actions of firefighters in the current pandemic context should be sought in view of the dynamics (municipal/local) of each fire department and in the altruistic essence of the volunteerism that they frame. ResWearchers can conclude that Portuguese fire departments are characterized by work of proximity to the population and are very much based on volunteering. Indeed, the characteristics of voluntary fire departments are, among other things, to belong to a humanitarian firefighters association and to be made up of firefighters on a voluntary basis. They are associations with their own legal status, which defines them as non-profit legal entities dedicated to the protection of people and property. Their missions include rescuing the injured, sick. or shipwrecked, and extinguishing fires (ISDR 2016). It makes perfect sense to list the activities carried out by firefighters in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic that, in addition to meeting their regular mission, also demonstrate initiative and the ability to adapt to new circumstances within an H2H paradigm. The population is used to the proximity of the firefighters in meeting their needs, but several projects have arisen in the current crisis and the circumstances allow for an extension of the capacity of the firefighters and their coverage (Dudman 2020).