Michael Lowry (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Last week, a woman in her 60s died in an ambulance on the way to hospital. Two hours before this woman died, an ambulance was en route to transport her to hospital. In this case, the ambulance, on its way to the critically ill woman, was stood down and was diverted to care for a man with a back injury. When the paramedics arrived, the man walked out of his home and stepped into the ambulance. When a crew eventually arrived for the woman, she was carried out of her home by stretcher. This was the last time that she saw her home. The description given of the man's injury pushed him up the priority list and pushed her down. He ticked more boxes on the ambulance service's emergency scale. This is a preprogrammed computer system that determines patient priority. It is a computer that decides based on a tick in a box how urgently an ambulance should arrive. If an ambulance is on its way to a call, it can be stood down and diverted to just about anywhere, whether another town, another county or even another province.

For example, a recent shift from the Thurles ambulance base started at 8 p.m. That night crew was dispatched from Thurles to Nenagh, then back to Cashel. The next call was to Ballingarry and they were then sent to Tullow, County Carlow, diverted to New Ross and from there to Gowran and Thomastown. They were then sent back to Carlow town. This involved seven and a half hours of non-stop driving and only one patient to be transferred to hospital. While all this frantic driving was happening, Thurles was left without a service.

This situation is being replicated every week as Tipperary ambulances are diverted to other regions. Last week, for example, the south-east region operated at 50% capacity due to long-term sick leave, exhaustion and lack of staff to fill rosters. Exhausted paramedics rush along the highways and byways of Ireland, their 12-hour shifts stretching to 15 hours and more. They have no food breaks or downtime. A recent study showed 50% of shifts run over their designated finish times. This is dangerous and unsustainable. Social media recently highlighted an ambulance crew who went off the road through fatigue at the end of their shift. Paramedics across Ireland feel ignored and frustrated. Many suffer from burnout and anxiety and morale is at an all-time low. An independent review of the ambulance service is urgently required. It needs to be conducted from the bottom up and carried out without delay.

See this speech in context