Thunder Bay city council approves EMS staffing increase
Boost in number of paramedics needed to keep up with demand: EMS chief
Superior North EMS (SNEMS) will have more paramedics on the road after Thunder Bay city council approved a staffing increase this week.
SNEMS Chief Wayne Gates asked council at Monday's meeting to approve an increase of 88 staffing hours every two weeks.
Paramedics are seeing increasing call volumes. They're responding to one emergency call about every 15 minutes and the agency is on track to see more than 32,000 calls in total this year, Gates told CBC News prior to Monday's meeting.
The call volume is leading to "almost daily situations" where SNEMS doesn't have a unit available to respond to 911 calls, Gates said.
On Wednesday, he told CBC News via email that councillors were "very supportive" when approving his request on Monday.
The staffing increase will cost about $535,000 a year, which will come from unbudgeted revenues from operational programs, a report to council states.