Press Release, 18.05.2020

Boris Vishnevsky, head of the Yabloko faction in the Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg, turned to St.Petersburg Governor Alexander Beglov with a proposal to take urgent measures to remedy the situation in St. Petersburg when citizens who have been diagnosed with a coronavirus infection should wait for the ambulance for 10-11 hours after the call.

In particular, Vishnevsky proposes to organise separate premises on the hospital territories with isolated wards, where patients delivered by the ambulance and waiting to be registered in the hospital would be under the supervision of qualified medical stuff; create “intake tunnels” in hospitals, where each “tunnel” will have a separate registrar issuing medical history sheets for patients (now this work holds the whole queue); in addition, use the computer-based management of calls and queues in hospitals.

“I understand that the situation is mainly associated with the considerable time of admission and registration of patients with COVID-19 in hospitals. Ambulances stand in front of hospitals in a queue waiting to transfer patients to hospital for many hours (11 hours as of 16 May), turning into “wards on wheels” instead of going to other patients,” runs Vishnevsky’s appeal.

“Consequently, doctors not only lose precious time, but also there emerges a threat to the life and health of patients who receive medical care later than needed. It seems to me that urgent measures are needed to remedy the situation,” Boris Vishnevsky said.

It should be noted that long queues from ambulances have been observed by St. Petersburg hospitals receiving patients with COVID-19.