Over E2m medics bill for PLE teams
MBABANE - It will cost an arm and a leg – nothing less than E2 million per season for full utility of emergency medical service providers. Medical emergency services will not come cheap for the 28 Premier League of Eswatini (PLE) teams this season. After the PLE’s move to abandon providing the emergency medical services through paramedics and ambulances and left it to teams to ensure its availability, it will soon be an issue with the clubs who spend more to play than what is won per season. This publication established that each hosting team must provide the emergency medical services for the duration of the match and the cost for a single match. However some of the teams are not financially stable and are dependent on individuals.
Each hosting team at minimum cost is expected to part with E3 500 for the services from a private provider, but it is only limited to the players, technical bench and match officials. It does not include fans and the extra costs of having to transport a player to hospital.
Each of the 14 elite league teams and the 14 in the National First Division (NFD) will host 13 times this season. If you multiply that with E3 500 for each elite team, it totals to E45 500. Take the service beyond the pitch and technical area to the grandstands where the fans guests are, the cost rises to E7
EMERGENCY MEDICAL SERVICES COST PER PLE SOCCER MATCH:
E3 500 (Covers players, match officials and technical bench only and ends inside the stadium).
E1 500 (Covers transportation to hospital)
E7 500 (Covers players, technical bench, match officials and fans)
E1 500 (Covers transportation to hospital)
500 before transporting them to hospital which equates to E97 500.
With transport costs in case of having to rush one to the hospital, the charge goes up as each time that happens, there is an extra E1 500 charge, taking to over E100 000, as that does not happen every time. At the minimum E3 500 charge, all 28 teams would pay about E1 274 000, but the figure may be less as NFD is said to be getting slightly lower charges.
These are figures from the private sector which had been used by some of the
teams and the PLE during games against MTN Premier League participation fee for elite league teams of E100 000 each per season, while in the NFD its E30 000 per team. At the price of E7 500 for the 28 teams, it would rise up to an estimated E2.1 million. The capacity of the stadium also counts, for example at Somhlolo National Stadium the sitting capacity is 7 500 people so the charge will also be E7 500 but NFD teams rarely use this venue and Mavuso Sports Centre.
One of the medical service providers, on condition of anonymity, said medical emergency services do not come cheap. They said in medical emergency services that cover the whole stadium in South Africa (SA) cost around E25 000 per match.
With about six games already played in the premier league and NFD, teams are seen struggling to provide medical services in games. Ambulances are rarely seen and there have been instances where stretchers would be availed late in the game once there was a need for it but without any paramedics or first aid providers to use it. It then takes the teams’ officials to play the role of the trained emergency medical services providers. This happened during the Nsingizini and Royal Leopard game whereby midfielder Junior Magagula had to be supported side by side by two officials to get treatment outside of the King Sobhuza II Memorial Stadium in Nhlangano on Wednesday. “Also, besides the expenses involved, we also want to be assured safety but clearly our teams cannot guarantee that and we’ve had incidents before where we were threatened in our duty,” said the source.
It was also gathered that even the public sector was also concerned about its safety and also that of the vehicles in case they were attacked and damaged by fans during games. The main gist here is who then pays for the damages. They said they had shouldered such damages before so it has to be clear that teams or the PLE pays for any damage by fans to their vehicles.