England's firefighters to take on role of home health nurses and social workers

Somehow I don't think the firefighters are too keen on this idea . . .


Firefighters to ease pressure on NHS by conducting health checks in people's homes
Firefighters throughout England are preparing to support the NHS by conducting hundreds of thousands of health checks in people’s homes . . . The NHS will “piggyback” on the 670,000 home visits carried out by the fire service every year. As well as checking smoke alarms and fire risks, firefighters will now deal with trip and fall hazards, remind people to get their flu vaccinations and make sure homes are kept warm over the winter.
. . .
New “safe and well” checks could even involve firefighters discussing health matters such as weight, smoking and mental well-being with people, while they will also seek to refer people to appropriate local support for issues such as unemployment, claiming benefits, and drug and alcohol schemes.
. . .
Part of our ‘safe and well’ check will include checking there is adequate heating, adequate insulation and then referring people to their housing provider or local schemes to ensure they are claiming and in receipt of the benefits to which they are entitled to ensure they are safe and warm during the winter. That seems entirely sensible to us.”

Any person working with law enforcement is at risk when going to someone's home. Weapons, drugs, drinking, domestics . . . all sorts of situations could be immediately present and are a source of immediate stress to the occupant. I'm sure the visits are pre-arranged but probably are often rescheduled per the nature of a fireman's primary job. Can you imagine some of the crummy situations they've worked lately and then be asked how many home visits they got done that day?

yesterday i posted a thread about how they are gonna be cops too.

basically, what ALL of the emergency services are being told, in a backhand way, is doom is coming, and you will do EVERY job currently being done by three separate services, whether they like it or not, assuming they survive, of course

i bet cops are getting basic fire fighting training at the moment, behind the scenes, wouldn't surprise me at all

hang on, here's one, from April this year, who can do all THREE!

[link to www.theguardian.com]



no messages being sent here, eh?

I haven't found anything yet about a pay hike for all this extra workload and paperwork . . .

They started doing this in Brazil over two decades ago. It hasn't worked out well. I was a paramedic for years and they tried this shit with us and it was a fucking disaster!

People see a fucking uniform and they lock up. And nowadays more than ever, people freeze at the sight of a badge. You go up to someone's door in an EMS uniform, which many services are required to wear a badge, and you are likely to get your fucking head shot off!

(Note: Many departments require their medics to wear these absurd polyester (fire hazard) uniforms with badges and brass. It's because some of the higher ups want to look professional. All that badge does, is give a criminal something easy to aim at! Me, I like a nice t-shirt with the words FIRE or EMS in big yellow letters.)

Any person working with law enforcement is at risk when going to someone's home. Weapons, drugs, drinking, domestics . . . all sorts of situations could be immediately present and are a source of immediate stress to the occupant. I'm sure the visits are pre-arranged but probably are often rescheduled per the nature of a fireman's primary job. Can you imagine some of the crummy situations they've worked lately and then be asked how many home visits they got done that day?

Can't you picture it -- firefighter helps put out some poor guy's burning house -- the guy's standing there with the shakes, making sure everyone's OK, maybe has a cig hanging out of his mouth and wishing he had a stiff drink -- then the firefighter has to ask him about his weight, whether or not he smokes, and if he has any mental health issues.

I haven't found anything yet about a pay hike for all this extra workload and paperwork . . .

But where will they find the time to wash the trucks,cook&sleep.