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Qatar tribune
The number of calls the Hamad Medical Corporation’s Ambulance Service gets on a daily basis has gone up by 30 percent from nearly 700 to more than 1,000 amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
Even during the pandemic, Dr Robert Owen, CEO of the Ambulance Service, said it responds to hundreds of emergency calls not associated with the coronavirus infection.
“The outbreak of Corona Virus (Covid-19) presented many challenges that we had not faced before, but we have planned and prepared well for such crises during the past years,” Dr Owen said.
Over the past decade, work was undertaken to expand the capacity of ambulance services and develop the quality of care provided, he said, adding that ensuring the availability of equipment and expertise required to manage crises such as the coronavirus outbreak was part of that development.
Planning and preparing for crises is reflected in the ability to provide services fully, including the safe transportation of confirmed or suspected cases, and the provision of medical services within different regions, he added.
Brendon Morris, the Executive Director of the Ambulance Service, said, “The coronavirus outbreak reflected our ability to respond to a high number of emergency calls, as we witnessed an increase of 30 percent of our daily activity during the (Covid-19) pandemic. Before that, we used to receive about 700 calls a day, and this number continued to increase until it reached nearly 1,000 calls per day in recent months.”
He added that hundreds of calls arrive to the ambulance service daily from people suffering from medical emergencies that are not related to the Coronavirus (Covid-19), and that its employees are fully prepared to provide assistance for any situation that requires emergency medical intervention.

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12/05/2020
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