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Victoria ambulances
Victoria ambulance network down to 5% capacity amid Covid demand. Photograph: Joe Castro/AAP
Victoria ambulance network down to 5% capacity amid Covid demand. Photograph: Joe Castro/AAP

‘Reality of the pandemic’: Victorian ambulances hit peak stress with capacity down to 5%

This article is more than 2 years old

Union secretary says ‘they were texting paramedics at four o’clock in the morning asking if anyone could come in’

Victoria’s ambulance network was down to just 5% of its fleet on Friday night amid pressures due to Covid-19, and at one point 72 people were waiting for an ambulance at the same time.

The Victorian Ambulance Union secretary, Danny Hill, said the peak stress on the system happened in the final hour of 1 October, with paramedics and patient transport officers so stretched and overworked that the union was concerned about their ability to drive home.

“This is the reality of the pandemic,” Hill told Guardian Australia.

“I can’t recall a time where we have ever been down to 5% of the fleet, the lowest it might get to is down into the teens. The rest of our crew was either ramped at hospitals, or already attending other cases. So we had a very low number of crew available to respond to new emergencies in the community.

“They were texting paramedics at four o’clock in the morning asking if anyone could come in and assist. I haven’t heard of people being called in to work at that time of the morning before. At one point, there were 72 people, real patients, who had been told they would get an ambulance but who could not get an immediate response.”

Adding to the stress was that people diagnosed with Covid are tying up the system by calling an ambulance after receiving a call or text that they had tested positive, even if they did not have serious symptoms. Hill said people sometimes panicked upon receiving the diagnosis, but for many cases it would be more appropriate to contact “nurse on call”, a pharmacist or a GP for advice.

“There’s been a lot of Covid cases who don’t actually require transportation to a hospital,” Hill said. “The crew then attend and reassure them at their home, but it still ties up crew for a long period of time. That crew is then not available to respond to urgent cases, to the elderly with health issues, to drug and alcohol cases, and it can have a real detrimental effect on the availability to get ambulances to patients.”

Last week, more than a dozen ambulances were filmed ramping outside the Northern hospital in Epping. Since then Covid cases in Victoria have continued to increase, as have hospital admissions.

Victoria’s deputy premier, James Merlino, said 498 people were in hospital with Covid-19 on Monday. Of those, 96 are in intensive care and 59 are on a ventilator.

Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation (Victorian branch) secretary, Lisa Fitzpatrick, said: “Nurses know they’re on the verge of a surge of Covid patients.”

“Easing of restrictions may feel like freedom to the community but it means our health system and nurses’ and midwives’ workload will be unrecognisable for some time.

“How big that surge is still depends on vaccination levels .”

Fitzpatrick described nurse fatigue as “severe”, as they were caring for unprecedented numbers of patients. “They are disheartened by the number of unvaccinated patients and preventable hospitalisations and deaths,” she said.

An emergency doctor at Northern hospital said it was already busy pre-Covid, “and now the Covid situation has added extra stress on the system”.

“Some non-Covid beds have closed to make room for Covid patients, while staff from non-Covid areas have been redeployed to Covid areas,” the doctor said.

“Everyone is stretched out, but we are doing the best we can.”

She said infection control protocols are stringent, including in non-clinical areas, so staff can avoid being furloughed.

“Many services have moved to Telehealth,” she said. “We do asymptomatic testing for staff, daily saliva tests and weekly nose-swabs for those working in ED. Staff in ED are working extremely hard. They are really amazing.”

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