Ambulance union says there is little doubt lives are being lost due to delays

Victoria’s Ambulance union says there is little doubt lives are being lost due to delays and issues with Triple Zero.

Two tragic examples emerged publicly on Thursday.

Danny Hill from the Ambulance union told Neil Mitchell they were both “classic examples” of what he’d been hearing anecdotally.

He said it was hard to know for sure whether those two people could have been saved, but it wasn’t a stretch to say some lives over the past few months had been lost needlessly.

“No question,” he said.

“That’s not a reach, at all.

“Our paramedics deliver some of the best cardiac arrest outcomes anywhere in the world, but if it takes them 20, 30 minutes to get to that case, then the life of the person they’re trying to save … it’s futile … that amount of down time, you just can’t bring a patient back from that.”

He said it “wasn’t good enough” to blame the issues on “unprecedented” spikes in the system.

Press PLAY below to hear Danny Hill speak with Neil Mitchell

Ambulance Victoria’s chief operations officer, Libby Murphy, addressed the situation a short time later.

Press PLAY below to hear her speak with Neil Mitchell