WHILE it is widely known that the Covid-19 crisis is putting an unprecedented strain on the public healthcare system, the severity of the situation does not really hit home until one tries to call for an ambulance and get a bed for a very sick person who may not last the night without medical aid.

Subang Jaya assemblyman Michelle Ng found herself desperately seeking medical aid one night for an elderly woman living alone, who had been abandoned by her employer.

Ng shared the story on Twitter.

“The day before at about 10.30pm, I got an urgent call from a resident who lives in one of Subang’s low-cost flat,” Ng wrote.

“YB. Maaf ganggu. Minta bantu. Ada seorang penduduk sesak nafas, muntah-muntah. Kata nak mati. Tak tahu nak buat apa. Dah tunggu ambulans dari 999 sejak 6 petang masih tak muncul. Tolong. 999 mintakan kami hantar sendiri (Sorry to bother you, YB. Please help. There is a resident who is short of breath, vomiting. Says she wants to die, does not know what to do. I’ve been waiting for an ambulance from 999 since 6pm and it still hasn’t shown up. Help. 999 has asked us to send her to hospital ourselves).

“999 pun kata mereka lumpuh dan kes ini bukan satu-satunya kes sesak nafas. Katanya kes dari pagi masih belum selesai lagi dan masih ada 7 orang tunggu dalam senarai (999 says they are paralyzed and that ours is not the only case of shortness of breath. They say they are still not done with this morning’s cases and there are still seven people on the waiting list).”

The caller went on to tell Ng that the woman who was sick lived alone and that that her employer had abandoned her at Shah Alam Hospital. Ng was told that the woman had fallen into the drain on her way home because she was too weak to walk.

The woman was also illiterate and did not know how to type, let alone use MySejahtera to update her Covid status or Selangkah to register for admission to the covid assessment centre at Stadium Melawati.

Ng said she then called up SJ Beacon, Subang Jaya’s emergency ambulance. 

“I knew that it was way past their operating hours, and I was trying my luck. In a turn of events, I was informed that one of their paramedics was not well, and that they too do not know if they will be operational tomorrow.

“With a lump in my throat, I said, ‘Well if the patient is still alive and you are operational tomorrow, could you consider sending her to the hospital?’

“‘We will try, but they’re likely to send us on a merry-go-round. There are just not enough beds’”.

Ng said she and her assistant, Henry, spent the night calling one ambulance service after another, getting the same reply each time.

“We only take cases from 999. And as it is now all six of our ambulances are on the road and they all have a waiting list of three cases each. I am so sorry,” the person at St John’s told her. 

Meanwhile, Ng’s assistant said 999 had channelled their request to the nearest hospital but that it was up to the hospital to decide to respond. The hospital was supposed to call them back.

Sixteen hours later, Ng was stil waiting for the call.

Her assistant gave her the update: Ambulance A is uncontactable. Ambulance B is charging RM850. Ambulance C and D are uncontactable. Ambulance E is charging RM1209. Ambulance F is charging a base rate of RM700 plus RM200 for every hospital that it goes to because there is no guarantee that the hospital they go to has a bed available and it may have to visit a few.

About 2am the next day, Henry texted Ng to say that the ambulance had arrived – and that the woman’s BP was soaring. They had to give her oxygen as she had difficulty breathing after walking down the stairs.

At 2.52am, Henry informed Ng that they had reached Hospital Kuala Lumpur, and that they are waiting for the doctor.

At 7.43am, the update said:  “She is in the decompression room now. There are seven other people before her waiting for a bed. At least she is inside.”

Before going to bed after two sleepless nights, Ng signed off with: “Subangites, we are far from the clear. Our system has collapsed. This virus is ravaging families.

“Get vaccinated, have conversations with the people around you who are worried about the vaccine, do not go out if you do not need to, double mask, ventilate your premises. We must get through this, and we cannot do it unless we are all in this together.” – August 3, 2021.