The ambulance service was starting to see cracks in the health system before the Delta variant really took off — a wave of patients with chronic health conditions becoming more acute because they’d put off their healthcare. Now Delta is here, it’s a disaster for us.
We start our shift and there are jobs waiting in the queue that are 11 hours old. That’s how we know the shift is going to be unrelenting.
It’s absolutely demoralising.
These low-acuity jobs could be a broken bone or an elderly person who needs help to get off the floor, and we know if there’s been a delay the job will be harder because it’s distressing for the patient. And anything that’s distressing for the patient is distressing for us.
We’re running seriously high-acuity patients from one side of the metro to another. Sometimes not everyone is going to make it or get the care they need purely because of that reason.
The new COVID-19 ward at St George Hospital filled up within a day. It had 16 patients in the department waiting for beds to become available, plus another four ambulances waiting to get in. The worst is Westmead Hospital, where the upper limits to offload a patient from the ambulance can be eight hours.
It’s the middle of winter and the ambulance doors have to be open for ventilation. It’s often pouring rain and you have to wrap patients in blankets to keep warm. You sit there and you listen to the radio with your patients stuck in the car, hearing high-acuity jobs like heart attacks and car accidents come up while the dispatch is begging on the other end to get anyone to attend.
I had three COVID patients back-to-back the other night, which is stressful because of the hypervigilance you have to have. Some of them are really sick with unbelievably low oxygen levels. You want to provide the best care but you’re cautious because you’re in the ambulance with them for three to four hours and a brush of the face, a ripped gown or a yawn could expose you to the virus.
NSW paramedics have copped two pay cuts since the pandemic started. Every time we get exposed to COVID we have to go into isolation for two weeks. The government doesn’t pay us penalties during this, which can amount to a third of our salary. Our families are close contacts and have to isolate with us, so it’s a compounding problem.
Politicians keep saying we’re valued. But the reality is we’re not, and turning up day after day is difficult when they don’t have enough respect for us not to cut our pay. 49 staff have come back from leave early. We need these breaks.
This isn’t a crisis that will end in October. This is an exponential workload that will be with us well into the next year.
Graduate programs have been paused, and graduates put into assistant positions, meaning they’re not getting the training they need to become certified paramedics.
The government hasn’t given us any modelling, plans or timeline for ambulance worker capacity. We’re lacking hope and confidence.
More importantly why are we dependent on reading this in Crikey to know about it.
how can the democratic society function in wide spread ignorance.
For starters, we no longer have anything which resembles a democratic society. It’s almost proto-fascist. The only thing we have left is that we get to vote every three or four years depending on what level of so-called government you’re talking about. Even that is skewed. Most people don’t read outlets like this, or the Guardian, or Michael West, or IA. The Murdoch papers and Nine Entertainment don’t tell the people anything about what’s really going on.
True, the major media outlets are now dictated to by corporate interests. Not sure how their “journalists” sleep at night.
On large piles of money, a proven salve for ‘consciences’, if any.
Hi Crikey
This is one of those important pieces that I think you should release from behind the paywall so everyone can read it
No wonder we have no faith in the politicians, they have really dropped the ball with COVID and left us all exposed without having access to treatment when we need it now. Patients are missing out on regular treatments and procedures too. We should be doubling the intake of new doctors, nurses, ambos and hospital staff. As a Production Manager I find their lack of forward planning and action a disgrace!! The medical system was already a shambles, (thanks Tony Abbott!) it will be a miracle if it recovers now!
How long will it take for people to realise that under the influence of Morrison’s extra curricular beliefs, this is their forward planning. Impossible to even consider? Start considering it.
We need some one with covid to join Hillsong now.
This mob worships the US system where everyone pays or doesnt get service. The most horrible and unfair system when we are meant to be a community. Ambos are wearing thin with long waits with patients on board because ther is insufficient triage, beds, and nurses to take care of the sick.
The unvarnished total truth is that Australians had an opportunity to never experience this horror.
https://insidestory.org.au/a-little-jab-now-and-then/
How and why Australians have been killed, are being killed and will have lasting side effects from covid, there is only one reason and it’s the Coalition, can’t be denied no matter how much they lie. We could have all been vaccinated by February2021 but for Morrison and his Coalition and the relentless Coalition destruction of a once fantastic public service.
The vaccination disaster is the worst national public policy failure in modern Australian history
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/sep/12/in-hindsight-there-was-no-foresight-how-australia-bungled-its-pfizer-covid-deal
The unvarnished total truth is that Australians had an opportunity to never experience this horror.
https://insidestory.org.au/a-little-jab-now-and-then/
How and why Australians have been killed, are being killed and will have lasting side effects from covid, there is only one reason and it’s the Coalition, can’t be denied no matter how much they lie. We could have all been vaccinated by February2021 but for Morrison and his Coalition and the relentless Coalition destruction of a once fantastic public service.
To be read in conjunction with this article, and you will have the full tragedy perpetrated by Morrison and Berjiklian on this nation
The vaccination disaster is the worst national public policy failure in modern Australian history
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/sep/12/in-hindsight-there-was-no-foresight-how-australia-bungled-its-pfizer-covid-deal
all this praise (thoughts and prayers) for frontline workers and then we hear: “NSW paramedics have copped two pay cuts since the pandemic started.” – how low can Gladys go?
I don’t think we know a quarter of how low she has gone, perhaps the NSW ICAC will bring it all out.
Correct
Glad bag must not be happy with the ambos for some reason. It’s just pitiful that a work force like this has been pushed to the brink of exasperation for so long. What is the meaning of life? A Glad bag!…
Because Glad bag can do anything.
well where do you expect the money to come from? “you can’t tax your way to prosperity” we keep getting told. Tell that to Norway – highest standard of living in the world – I bet there’s no ramping in Norway. It’s time for people to understand if we want to stay one of the lowest taxing countries in the OECD, then this is the standard we can expect. BTW, yes, we are a low taxing country – 5th or 6th lowest in the OECD (total tax take as a proportion of GDP – taking all taxes into account: company,personal income, stampduties etc etc)
It isn’t so much the tax collected as the exemptions, deals etc where what should be legitimately taxable Isn’t collected. Think of the level of subsidy to the mining companies vis a vis the wealth being extracted as a for instance.
It’s just one of those prices you have to pay to have one of the bigliest bestest private property prices in the world..;-(
Well the bazillions $$$ that get wasted every week would go a long way to fixing some of the problems with the health system. We need a healthy workforce if we want to be successful in rebuilding the country. They just waste so much money its appalling.
You gotta be careful with waste – the perfect is the enemy of the good when it comes to waste reduction and cost cutting particularly in the public service. Thrifty managers are routinely punished compared to empire builders and feather bedders. No one ever got promoted for having a smaller budget.
That might be true on average but not for individuals who can’t afford “help” to game the system. If you don’t have a negatively geared property or a largish franked dividend stream youre a tad on your own.
The question is: who pays and who can avoid paying? And that’s before we get to the rent seekers and corporations demanding bribes to do what they would do anyway.
As with the UK and USA after a certain point tax becomes “optional”
The Norwegian tax return also includes The requirement to list all assets, cars, boats, motorbikes, jetskis,and any collections of value . The more you have the more you pay .
Beg to differ on Norway…
Having worked and studied in Sweden, paid 46% tax on a pathetic salary 30% lower than the UK and there was not much left at the end. The services are only great if you actually need them or build the quasi socialist life of a nuclear family that gets them (ie health, aged care, kids). Eating out is exorbitant, don’t even drink out cause it is all tax, government monopolies now nasty neoliberally privatised rule the roost across most services (think Telstra everywhere). Things are much more covertly neoliberal there than most are aware.
I nearly worked in Oslo and every time I went to Norway the food was woeful in quality, fresh stuff bland, trucked halfway across the EU or flown in from Israel which is unsurprising considering the winters. I love Scandinavia with all my heart and wanted to settle there, but there is a lot that is better here such as the cost of fuel, vehicles, public transport, lifestyle possibilities, dining and fresh produce.
We need to start more fairly taxing those who have it all, closing loopholes and paying sensible amounts for people in public service roles. Isn’t it interesting how covid bites hard those who’s working lives are most smashed by neoliberal policies to employment and services.