25 July 2000

Less abuse of Civil Defence Force line THE number of non-emergency calls made to the Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) ambulance centre fell in the first six months of the year, continuing a downward trend. There were 3,222 calls from January to June, compared to more than 5,400 calls in the same period last year -- a drop of more than 40 per cent. For the whole of last year, there were 9,269 such non-emergency calls whereas in 1998, the number was 19,174. The downward trend started after the SCDF raised its charge for such calls to $115 from $75 and introduced the non-emergency hotline in late 1998. This was to cut abuse of the emergency 995 line and to make sure that ambulance officers could respond faster to genuine cases. Giving the half-yearly statistics at a media conference yesterday, SCDF Commissioner James Tan said ambulance officers attended to 27,920 emergencies in the first six months of the year. This compared to 23,911 cases in the the same period last year. Despite the higher number of cases, there was less abuse of the emergency line. From about 13-15 per cent in the first half of last year, the number of non-genuine or prank calls through the emergency line fell to 10 per cent between January and June. Some years ago, it went up to as much as 40 per cent. The SCDF chief said: ""A quick response time is the main concern of the emergency-ambulance service, as every second counts. ""If the ambulances are used to convey non-emergency cases, then those who are in real need may be deprived of the service.'' He said his ambulance officers were also able to reach their patients faster although they handled more cases. They arrived within 11 minutes more than 75 per cent of the time. Between January and June last year, the ambulances achieved this SCDF standard only about 61 per cent of the time.

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