Malaga ambulance workers demand greater security guarantees after latest emergency vehicle fire

At the end of May, workers in the sector took to the streets of Malaga city to demand improvements in vehicles and the recovery of purchasing power that they had lost in recent years.

“By demanding greater security conditions, they are not doing it only for themselves, but for the people who are treated by ambulances”, said Francisco Aranda, the person in charge of medical transport in the Federation of Citizen Services of CCOO in Malaga.

He assured that the renewal and expansion of the current fleet of vehicles are necessary because: “we cannot continue working with old ambulances that have so many kilometres on the clock”.

Aranda emphasized that every time a vehicle breaks down, the cancellation of services increases. There are simply not enough of these emergency vehicles he stressed.

Ambulances from other health centres are subsequently forced to multiply their coverage areas for several hours. That is precisely what happened the same Monday of the fire in Coin in another part of the Costa del Sol he added.

Medical transport in Malaga depends on Asistencia Sanitaria Malagueña (ASM), the company subcontracted by the Andalucian Health Service (SAS).

However, according to Aranda: “the one who has to ensure that this service is provided with 100 per cent safety guarantees is the health administration itself because, although it is a subcontracted company, the workers to whom this service is provided are the users of public health”.

Their main demand is for a new tender to be published, as in the meantime it is not possible to renew fleets, contracts or improve the workers’ conditions.

“We are in limbo waiting for a tender that is dormant”, Aranda explained, stressing that health transport in Malaga is “a bit abandoned”.

He added that for areas such as Fuengirola and Mijas, which double their population in summer, there are only two units available.

In response, the government delegation affirmed that they were: “awaiting the resolution of the tender for the new specifications”, in order to be able to award the contract to a company that can accredit the conditions.

The Health Delegate stressed that his “fundamental concern” was to provide new and more equipment in areas of difficult coverage and in those parts of the province where they consider that more units are needed, as reported by laopiniondemalaga.es.