Action by health minister urged after ambulance service review

Both Siptu and the body representing ambulance staff have demanded urgent action following a review of the National Ambulance Service which highlighted a range of shortcomings and targets it said were unachievable.

The National Ambulance Service of Ireland emergency service baseline and capacity review, commissioned by the HSE and carried out by Lightfoot Solutions UK, outlines how, even though the NAS is often compared to English ambulance services, it serves a much greater rural population than its English counterparts and there are only 40% as many ambulance calls per head of population as in England.

However, it has similar performance targets — including a target of an 80% response rate in eight minutes for Echo and Delta (life-threatening and potentially life-threatening) calls.