in any emergency situation whether be an ambo call or fire call or MVA, if the general public are around then some of em can be right arse holes, i have been nearly run over while diverting traffic because a fuckwit was on his cell phone or something instead of paying attention, admittedly it was dark and the diversion was a long way from the accident scene at the time, but one would imagine red flashing lights and an accident sign and a guy standing there in full fire fighting kit may have just given it away, not easy to move quickly in bunker coat and trou.
I've gone and signed it, the St John Ambos picked me up six weeks ago and took me to hospital. They were professional, courteous and caring. The first thing they said to me was that they were genuine St John ambos because they were in civvies, they told me they were continuing to work while in dispute with St John so would not wear the St John uniform, I've heard since that St John has stated that any ambo not wearing the uniform on shift will be docked $10 per shift.
It takes special people to do this job. This dispute would soon be over if every ambo downed tools, but they see a greater need for their services than that so are working on through the dispute, not begrudgingly but giving the public their full support.
can you imagine the uproar if they ambo's downed tools, fuck me, my pager would be going all the time cause they would then respond the big red trucks to everything.
don't disagree tho, and this single crewing shit is BS, how the fuck is a paramedic supposed to drive the ambo and monitor/treat the victim in the back.
they do need more support from the general public and those that abuse or get shitty with any emergency service whether it be paid or volly's should have the fucken book rammed down their throats, don't need arrogant toss pots adding to an already stressful situation
All of this "showcases" the she'll be right attitude of many in this country. If we consider ourselves to be inhabitants of a first-world nation then perhaps we need to be prepared to pay the cost of being a first-world nation and have paid professional emergency crews for ambulance and fire service throughout the country.
As russd7 said: "can you imagine the uproar if the ambo's downed tools". Well can you imagine the uproar if the taxpayers were told they were going to have to pay for 24-hour pay professional emergency response crews?
But, I do think it is time we as a nation started to have these sorts of conversations - conversations about fire and ambulance services, conversations about how we can reduce the road toll, conversations about we treat the police and medical professionals - think House Surgeons, conversations about how we treat the lowest paid and those who need social support? conversations about what we believe is important to be a civilised first-world nation...
Moi, doesn't the presence of Axle in our population preclude us from ever being "a civilised first-world nation"?
Not going to work...
To licence a car for 12 months = $43.50
To licence a 601cc+ bike for 12 months = $24.50
What makes the difference in the total amount paid is the ACC levy - to have ACC funding emergency servise, i.e. fire and ambulance including rescue helicopters, would require a change in legislation covering the activities and responsibilities of ACC. I can't see that happening...
I am not concerned with the cost of training a doctor.
I am more concerned with house surgeons and registrars working ridiculous hours. If I am admitted to A&E, I'd much rather have a registrar who has done 4 hours of their shift examining me than one who has do 8+ hours.
ACC does fund some of the ambulance service. Around 80% of St John is funded by a combination of the Ministry of Health, ACC and the DHBs.
http://www.stjohn.org.nz/funding
Most of the fire service is funded through the fire levy in insurance.
True - be nice to see a breakdown of who pays what percentage...
Though St John's is contracted to ACC to provide ambulance service, so would still expect change in either legislation or ACC protocols to fund a country-wide ambulance service.
What I hoped to point out was that to do such country-wide 24/7/365 funding would require "direction" from the politicians and I can't see that happening... unfortunately.
Yeah it would be great to get a breakdown of who pays what, I tried to find it but no luck so far.
Generally Ambulance jobs are classed as non-ACC (Medical stuff usually) or ACC (Car accidents, falls, workplace accidents etc). If the incident falls under ACC then I assume ACC pick up all of the pre-hospital costs for that patient - certainly St John doesn't charge ACC patients for the Ambulance part charge.
So ACC definitely funds the ambulance service in an indirect way, through picking up the costs for ACC patients. I expect they also supply bulk funding but I am not sure of this. However you are correct in that under the current model, ACC funding wouldn't apply to a lot of Ambulance calls as they are not classed as accidents (i.e heart attacks, strokes etc). I guess this is where the Ministry of Health and the local DHBs money will kick in.
I understand that St John has campaigned the government for more money to end single crewing. The CEO of St John has been banging on about it for a while now and he seems confident that single crewing will soon be a thing of the past. Time will tell.
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