Firemen with little training sent to medical emergencies

FIREMEN with barely any first aid training are being dispatched to thousands of medical emergencies, it has emerged.

Crews responded to 44,000 ambulance call-outs last year that would normally have been dealt with by paramedics, four times as many as in 2010, Home Office figures show.

A whistleblower who works for Kent Fire and Rescue said firefighters did not have the relevant qualifications or training to treat most patients.

“It’s just so wrong,” he told The Daily Mail. “It’s putting people at risk of fires. If a pump is off the road, and there’s a house fire nearby, then there’s no one to attend it for far too long.

“We only have a certain amount of kit. We have a first aid bag and it’s got tourniquets, oxygen, bandages to stop haemorrhaging and a defibrillator. But we have no drugs whatsoever. No adrenalin, which is what they need.”

Figures show that firemen were sent to 44,121 ambulance calls in the 12 months to June 2017. In 2010, the number stood at just 10,329.

Judith Jolly, a Lib Dem health spokesman, said: “Fire services have an important role to play responding to some medical emergencies, but shouldn’t be relied upon as a matter of routine.”

A spokesman for the Association of Ambulance Chief Executives said firemen were used “alongside an ambulance resource and never instead of an ambulance resource”.

Kent Fire and Rescue Service said it prioritised its response where there was a significant risk to life, and when required resources are relocated from other areas of the county to respond to and to support an increase in demand.