Disturbing new government figures published by the Parliamentary Inquiry into Ambulance Ramping show in the past five years 136 people have died in hospital shortly after they’d been ramped for an extended period.*
Of those tragic deaths, 44 occurred last financial year. That’s an average of nearly one death a week – a huge jump from 2018-19, when 16 people died.
While the numbers themselves are shocking, the reality is worse. Behind every number is a real life lost, with loved ones left traumatised, grief stricken and often angry.
The Rockliff Government has callously referred to these 136 deaths as “administrative data”, and denied any link between people being ramped for an extended period and their death in the following hours. Paramedics, nurses and doctors, however, confirm more people with serious medical conditions are being ramped for long periods – unable to receive necessary treatment in this limbo land.
Tasmanian patients are being left ramped for 16 times longer than they were eight years ago. Without timely access to the proper care, there’s too often terrible impacts on patient health and survival.
Even these terrible new figures don’t tell the full story of the probable harms of ramping, with a Victorian study finding patients ramped for longer than only 17 minutes at greater risk of death in the following month.** The data published by the Parliamentary Inquiry today only shows the number of patients who died within a day, after being ramped for longer than 30 minutes. It’s highly likely many more people’s deaths have occurred as a result of ramping.
Tasmanians have already seen lots of stories of people dying while waiting for proper treatment, but these new numbers lay bare the devastating reality of ambulance ramping. The secretive Liberals would have deliberately left the public in the dark about how desperate ramping is, if it wasn’t for this Parliamentary Inquiry.
The Liberals have tried to ignore the evidence of ramping harms from other jurisdictions, and dismissed expert perspectives of paramedics, nurses, and doctors. Tasmanians are becoming more and more aware of the real life costs to patients and staff, and their calls for action are growing louder. It’s past time Premier Jeremy Rockliff and Health Minister Guy Barnett listen.
*The Parliamentary Inquiry asked the Department of Health about the number of patients who had died within 24 hours of hospital admission after having been ramped for an extended period (greater than 30 minutes). The response is available in full here, with the relevant information available on page 8.
**A study published last year by Ambulance Victoria, Monash University, and other institutions showed that ambulance ramping wait times of greater than 17 minutes increased the risk of patients dying in the next 30 days
