Covid inquiry told ambulance service lacked enough PPE

Aformer frontline paramedic has told an inquiry Scotland’s ambulance service was “nowhere near” being prepared for a potential pandemic when Covid-19 first started spreading throughout the country.

Robert Pollock, a clinical adviser paramedic working for the Scottish Ambulance Service (SAS), told the Scottish Covid-19 Inquiry yesterday it took managers “months” to acquire adequate levels and standards of PPE to protect staff during the first wave.

Mr Pollock, GMB Scotland branch secretary for West Ambulance Control Centre based in Cardonald, Glasgow, told to the inquiry he was tasked to monitor supplies of PPE within Scotland’s ambulance service when the pandemic hit in 2020.

He said members frequently raised concerns about the availability and quality of some of the PPE they had to use in the early days of the pandemic.

“What was available was not what they expected,” he said. “They wanted a much better level than was available at that time.”

Mr Pollock, who was a frontline paramedic before being taken off patientfacing duties for health reasons during Covid, said he monitored supplies of PPE in more than 400 vehicle stations.

He said he regularly tried to reassure staff reporting shortages that more PPE was coming but availability stayed an issue despite SAS efforts to acquire more.

Assurances he was given by managers that specific amounts of PPE would be delivered to stations often fell short, he said, adding: “I don’t think it was deliberate attempt to mislead. I just think they were overpromising and maybe let down by other third parties.”

Mr Pollock said supplies of all-in-one suits to protect staff from infection were particularly scarce early in the pandemic.

And the sizes of what suits were available to staff were often far larger than required, Mr Pollock said, adding they were clearly “not fit for purpose”.

“It took a long time to get more appropriate sizes and quantities of these particular suits.”

Asked how long some staff waited for more suits to be delivered, Mr Pollock replied: “Months. It took months.”

Mr Pollock went on to tell the inquiry workers were seeing TV images of medical staff working in other parts of the UK wearing the same suits and questioning why they were not given the same protection.

Asked why other parts of the UK appeared to have larger supplies of the suits, Mr Pollock replied: “I just think they were maybe more prepared in other parts of the country.”

Mr Pollock added he believed SAS managers had done their “level best” but “missed the boat” in terms of pandemic preparedness.

Moving on to discuss a training exercise previously held in the UK to test the country’s preparedness for an influenza outbreak, Mr Pollock said it identified “a lot of failings” involving equipment and resources and he felt lessons were not learned from the exercise.

“I think if they had done, I think we would have had a much more ready state when it (Covid-19) arrived,” he said.

“Despite that exercise taking place and the passage of time, in my opinion, we were nowhere near ready for a Covid-type virus.”

The inquiry continues.

UNPREPARED: A former frontline paramedic said the Scottish Ambulance Service had chronic PPE shortages.