The ambulance delays last night were the result of conditions that went untreated during lockdown.

“...medical conditions getting somewhat out of control to the point where it could’ve been a condition that might’ve easily been treated a bit more proactively months earlier” https://twitter.com/newscomauhq/status/1338614745562275842

One of the reasons I left Melbourne was because the outpatient system had multi year delays before COVID-19. After lockdown, public waitlists have blown out further. This won’t be fixed without a massive influx of funding and the Vic gvt has shown no signs they plan to do that

Look, it was made very clear during lockdown that the Vic gvt didn’t get a stuff about ppl with disabilities and chronic illness, so let’s talk about the risks to generally healthy ppl

The risk is you will have a thunderstorm asthma event or a huge heatwave or fire smoke conditions coincide with ambulances already struggling to transport the number of ppl who have spiralling healthcare issues due to untreated chronic health issues as well as emergency incidents

You’ll end up with a situation where ppl die at home - either because of chronic illness or critical illnesses - because Ambulance Victoria can’t manage the numbers of patients needing urgent care because Victoria didn’t adequately treat chronic illness patients during lockdown

Whenever Ambulance Victoria or @VicGovDHHS blame patients for not being “proactive”, remember that many specialist clinics closed their doors for months and when they reopened they insisted on reduced numbers of patients to ensure social distancing. Stop patient-blaming

Remember back at the start of COVID-19 when we decided to lockdown to “save the health system from getting overwhelmed”?

Chronic illness generally does three things: progresses, plateaus or leads to a palliative care state. Waiting lists aren’t healthcare. The health system crunch will only get worse as ppl with progressive illness on never-ending waitlists turn towards emergency care

Anyway, there’ll be days this summer and over the next five years where seemingly healthy ppl couldn’t get emergency care in time because the entire system has bottlenecked

One of the things I love about the @CPSUnion is they never blamed people on Centrelink for what the government is doing to their workforce

As a result, Centrelink recipients sided with @CPSUnion. Might be a good time for @AmbulanceVic employees who are members of @aeavicunion to have a look at that strategy of siding with customers/patients rather than blaming them for outcomes of shitty government policy

Anyway, I’m a paid up member of @AmbulanceVic. I think their staff try to do the best job they can. But I’m deeply unimpressed by patient blaming and plan to be pretty vocal about it