Government is looking to move away from having ambulance personnel, fire and police officers working as dispatchers in their respective fields.
Minister of Home Affairs and Information, Wilfred Abrahams, today hinted that by the time the new facility, which will house the Barbados Fire Service headquarters, the Bridgetown Fire Station and the Barbados Ambulance Service, comes online, there will be civilian dispatchers handling calls for the entities.
He was speaking ahead of a tour of the construction site where the new facility will be housed at The Pine, St. Michael.
“There is no good reason why a trained EMT should be answering a phone. There is no good reason why a trained police officer should be answering a phone. All those are tasks that can be done by properly trained civilian personnel…,” Mr. Abrahams outlined.
In addition, he disclosed that the logistical requirements for consolidating into one emergency number were being considered.
The Minister explained that, at present, the fire service, police and ambulance service could all be reached but at different numbers.
But, he stated, Government was getting to a point where there would be one emergency number for persons to call with a trained dispatcher sending the call where it needed to go.
“It prevents a lot of confusion with people making multiple calls. If you have one number it can be logged and handled in a systematic way,” he outlined.
Making reference to the housing of the Barbados Ambulance Service and the Barbados Fire Service together, Mr. Abrahams explained that there was a necessary correlation between the two services.
“Half of the time when the Fire Service is going out, the Ambulance Service is following close behind. This makes it easy, [and] we will also cut costs with shared resources, [and] a shared dispatch,” he said.