A protective enclosure provides patient privacy and protection from inclement weather to a patient on a mattress on a stretcher. The enclosure includes a pair of slidable base portions and a cover connected to, and extending between, the base portions. The base portions are movable toward and away from each other in a transverse common plane underneath the mattress along a transverse axis that extends widthwise of the mattress. The cover bounds an interior space in which a body part of the patient is received. The cover has an overhead structure that extends along the transverse axis above the transverse common plane.