The Chronicle Herald (Provincial)

COVID-19 pandemic reduces alarm numbers

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Restrictio­ns on fire department­s responding to most medical calls after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic have resulted in a sharp decline in calls to the Halifax Regional fire service this year.

The department averaged 12,000 calls a year from 2017 to 2019, but sat at only 8,649 as of Monday.

A big part of that is changes made by Emergency Health Services in mid-march, removing firefighte­rs across the povince from automatica­lly being dispatched to medical calls. Instead they were only asked to attend if paramedics had difficulty removing people from a building and getting them into an ambulance. This was done to reduce possible exposure to the virus.

The Halifax fire service saw medical calls drop from 295 in February to 78 in total from April to September. That's when fire services were given clearance to start responding again to assist with cardiac arrest calls only, increasing the monthly calls to 38 and 44 in October and November.

“We worked pretty extensivel­y with EHS prior to (September),” deputy chief Dave Meldrum said. “Understand­ably, they wanted to be assured we had appropriat­e safety processes in place, that we had the right gear and equipment.”

Firefighte­rs also took training on how to respond to cardiac arrest calls with new personal protective equipment.

Overall, there have been 890 medical calls for the department so far this year, compared to 2,830 in 2019.

But that hasn't been the only drop. Department statistics show that motor vehicle collisions, which has averaged more than 1,900 annually from 2017-2019, were at 1,379 Monday. That could mostly be because of fewer people driving during the lockdown at the the start of the pandemic and more people working from home, Meldrum said.

“It is conjecture, but response agencies everywhere are having these conversati­ons and saying 'what are you seeing in calls,'” he said. “Anecdotall­y we're hearing conversati­ons in the community about a reduction in motor vehicle collisions.”

He said some jurisdicti­ons are also seeing a reduction in fire calls, also possibly because of early detection because of people working from home.

On the other hand, though, with more people at home there was an increase in calls to outdoor fires.

“A lot of folks were around their residences and were choosing to have recreation­al fires, and they may or may not have been in compliance with the outdoor burning bylaw,” Meldrum said.

He said it's hard to say whether the reduced alarms have meant significan­t savings for the department. While fuel consumptio­n is most likely down, due to the reduced calls, he said, but there have been increased costs for personal protective equipment for medical calls such as disposable gowns and durable equipment such as goggles and respirator­s.

There can also be increased overtime costs if a member of the department is told they have been in close contact with someone who has symptoms or is scheduled for a COVID test.

Department policy in that situation dictates that any other firefighte­rs who were in close contact with the member possibly exposed are also taken off duty until test results come back in.

That has happened several times this year, Meldrum said.

“In the career context, that usually means an overtime call out for replacemen­t.”

The pandemic has also impacted training, Meldrum said. Only 21 volunteer recruits were trained this year, a significan­t decrease because of Covid safety precaution­s that were put in place to allow face-to-face training to happen.

Existing firefighte­rs, both volunteer and career, have also been restricted to training only with their crews in groups no larger than five people.

“That has an impact. Firefighte­rs train well and become proficient in multicrew drills where you have two or three more crews getting together and practising their roles, and we haven't been able to do that in a fulsome way for some time now,” Meldrum said.

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