The chief executive of the Welsh Ambulance Service has issued a plea for people to “drink sensibly” during New Year celebrations, following a critical incident declared by the service on Monday which resulted in a backlog of some 340 emergency calls. More than half of the trust’s ambulance vehicles were also said to be waiting outside hospitals, exacerbating the pressure on emergency services. Jason Killens asked the public to only call in “genuine emergencies” and advised using the service “wisely”.
Winter viruses, including flu and Covid, were cited as reasons for the current pressure on the health system, as well as associated factors such as social care provision. Killens stressed that the pressure was not confined to Wales but could be seen across the UK: “The pressure across the urgent and emergency care in the NHS is well documented… it’s a challenge here in Wales, as it is in the rest of the UK.”
Killens apologised to those who had been waiting “far too long” for emergency assistance but assured that plans were in place to manage the backlog of calls. Meanwhile, Dr Rowena Christmas, Chair of the Royal College of GPs in Wales, called the ongoing situation “extraordinary”, and suggested it had been building up for a number of years.
Speaking to Radio Wales Breakfast, Killens explained that the declaration of a critical incident was designed to alert the NHS to an issue and the scale of pressure on the ambulance service. The public were advised to use alternative sources of assistance, including the symptom checker and advice provided by NHS 111 Wales, GPs, pharmacists and minor injuries units, unless in the event of a life-threatening emergency.
This is the second critical incident to be declared by the Welsh Ambulance Service in recent years, the first being in December 2020. In 2023, an extraordinary incident was declared following one ambulance’s 28-hour wait outside a hospital
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