Paramedic reveals he was SPAT at in his face while responding to a call at the start of the pandemic – and says it made him question: ‘Is this job really for me?’
- Stan Baxter described the ‘pressure’ he has been under amid coronavirus crisis
- Welshman revealed he was assaulted by member of the public, who spat on him
- Colleague described his ‘frustration’ with seeing people partying on New Year’s
A paramedic has revealed how a member of the public ‘spat at him in the face’ when he attended a call during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Stan Baxter, who works for the Welsh Ambulance Service, described the ‘pressure’ he and his colleagues have been under amid the coronavirus crisis and said the incident even made him question his job.
Speaking to BBC News, Stan revealed that he was assaulted by a member of the public, who horrifyingly spat in his face, during the first wave of Covid-19 last year.
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Stan Baxter (above), a paramedic for the Welsh Ambulance Service, has opened up about getting ‘assaulted’ by a member of the public during the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic
Cameras followed Stan and his colleagues as they responded to call outs in Wales
Stan recalled: ‘During the peak of the pandemic last year, I was assaulted by a member of the public where I was spat at in the face. And that’s really the only time that I’ve stopped and gone: “Is this for me?”‘
But he was quick to add that the ‘vast majority’ of people have been ‘fantastic’ and have even offered to buy himself and his fellow paramedics coffees while on shift.
Meanwhile, Stan’s work partner Luke Robinson described how ‘frustrating’ it was to see people ‘having parties’ on New Year’s Eve while he was responding to health concerns.
The paramedic claimed that while he was working on December 31, he heard large gatherings going on in nearby buildings, making it clear that some people ‘aren’t listening’ to the rules.
Luke continued: ‘It’s really frustrating because it really hammers home that some people aren’t listening to the rules.’
Stan (above) described the ‘pressure’ he and his colleagues have been under amid the coronavirus crisis and said one incident even made him question his job
He added that he wasn’t surprised to see a second wave of Covid-19 occuring after seeing such gatherings at the end of last year.
Ahead of New Year’s Eve, Boris Johnson had urged people to stay at home as nearly 80 per cent of the UK was under strict Tier 4 coronavirus regulations.
Jason Killens, the boss of the Welsh Ambulance Service, told the BBC that the service is still under ‘extreme pressure’ amid the ongoing coronavirus crisis.
He revealed that at one point 400 staff, which equals 12 per cent of all their workers, were sick or self-isolating, which was exacerbated by high call numbers.
Although he admitted that the pressure was less compared to the end of 2020, which he said was the hardest period of the whole pandemic, he said that more difficult times still lie ahead.
The paramedic revealed that he was assaulted by a member of the public, who horrifyingly spat in his face, during the first wave of Covid-19 last year
In December, Welsh ambulances spent more than 11,661 hours waiting to transfer patients outside ambulances after the service declared a ‘critical incident’.
Ambulance delays come as the paramedics have to social distance and clean ambulances and equipment to keep themselves and others protected from Covid.
Patients also have to be tested for the contagious virus before they are admitted to hospital, with the strict measures affecting how quickly crews can respond to calls.
But Mr Killens insisted that he believes the Welsh Ambulance service is on the ‘home straight’ in dealing with the pandemic due to the vaccine being steadily rolled out.
More than four million people across Britain have been given a first dose of the Covid-19 vaccine since the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine was approved for use in December.
The UK has also since allowed the use of the Oxford University/AstraZeneca jab, alongside an inoculation against coronavirus developed by Moderna.