Ambulance trusts will put on extra staff over the weekend but reminded people all alcohol-related calls took paramedics away from life-threatening incidents
London Ambulance Service said it is likely to receive more than 8,000 emergency calls over New Year’s Day thanks to an additional surge in demand after midnight. A typical busy day before the pandemic would have seen about 5,500 calls into its 999 control rooms.We are already extremely busy this winter.
Every avoidable alcohol-related call we attend means another patient who might have a life-threatening condition will wait longer and will potentially come to harm.” The warnings come as latest NHS England data, published on Friday, shows hospitals already dealing with an 80 per cent rise in flu patients. An average of 3,746 flu patients were in beds each day last week, up from 2,088 the previous week. At this point last December there were only 34 people in hospital with flu.
The number of hospital patients in England testing positive for Covid was 9,459 on December 28, up 9 per cent on the previous week and the highest total since October 24. Meanwhile, staff absences due to Covid at hospital trusts in England have risen by 47 per cent in a month from an average of 5,448 a day in the seven days to November 27 to 8,029 last week.
Saffron Cordery, the interim chief executive of NHS Providers, said: “This is impacting on care right through the system, including ambulances, hospital A&Es, mental health and community services.
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