Afternoon:
14°c
'Booze bus' to run all year as binge drinking rockets
Sophie Goodchild, Health Editor20.03.09
An ambulance for drunks will run all year in London to cope with the growing scourge of binge drinking.
Today London Ambulance Service announced its "booze bus" will operate every week to relieve pressure on other crews of medics and to save thousands of pounds.
Figures reveal 999 staff receive more than 60,000 alcohol-related calls a year, making it harder for ambulance workers to reach critically ill people. Research shows the booze bus saves the equivalent of two to four ambulances per shift.
Since starting four years ago, the service has only operated during periods of high demand such as weekends in December, New Year's Eve, and the 2006 World Cup. But now a paramedic crew will trawl the West End each week in the Central London Alternative Response Vehicle, treating drunken revellers.
The booze bus can carry 20 patients and will run from Thursday to Saturday from 7pm until the early hours.
Kevin Brown, LAS operations manager, said: "People with minor injuries caused by too much alcohol do not always need hospital. The bus helps us treat these without clogging up A&E."
The bus was the brainchild of paramedic Brian Hayes, who said that a walk-in centre for drunks in Soho was also being planned.
He added. "Making the booze bus permanent shows it's making a difference. The way people binge drink at the moment, I don't think we even scratch the surface."
Ministers face increasing pressure to act over what health experts and police warn is the devastating social impact of excessive drinking. This week the Government's chief medical officer Sir Liam Donaldson called for a minimum price of 50p per unit of alcohol to curb consumption.
Today top doctors will use the British Medical Association's annual public health conference to attack the "failure" of the Government's strategy on alcohol. Members will table a motion backing a minimum unit price and tough policies to reduce alcohol marketing, such as a ban on advertising.
The Evening Standard also spoke to a senior doctor, a counsellor, a bar owner, and a recovering alcoholic.
Each gave their experience of the impacts of binge drinking on individuals and society.
Reader views (11)
Why do the authorities put up with binge drinking. We know when it occurs and why it occurs, as regular as clockwork. Just put an end to the causes. Simple.
- Dhanraj, basildon
I dont see how the bus helps clogging in a and e as decribed by Kevin LAS manager. These people should not be conveyed to a and e if they are just drunk. Ive worked in a and e and it is no fun when the booze bus brings 5 or 6 drunk patients to us at one time !!! i understand this bus helps LAS meet its targets but they are just putting the problem elsewhere i.e the hospital a and e departments. There are other solutions which need investment in if only commissioners would be prepared to bite the bullet
- Anon, london
Uh oh - I see a tax coming..... Labours answer to EVERYTHING!!
It frustrates me that we have the second highest alcohol tax in Europe which out pays ANY health costs and makes a tidy profit for the Government yet they complain when they have to spend some of that revenue.
Disgusting approach from a frankly pathetic joke of a government.
- Malcolm Jones, London
Why not pick them up in a 'Black Maria',-destination-Brixton prison, -and charge £50 for the fare?
- Huggy, Cumbernauld Scotland
How does one expect the stagger-in....I mean walk-in centre for drunks to be effective? They're going to be so out of their heads on booze, 95% of them probably won't be able to even find their way there, let alone remember that it's even there!
- Gene, London
Why do people worry about what things cost? If this frees up ambulances, the saving lives is different than spending money...
You can't compare money to life!
- Adrian, london
This comes in the same catagory as sun burn in the British Army, in other words "a self inflicted injury" which meant you were in trouble.So what is to stop a cost of fifty pounds or so per person for this service surely that would have some impact?..
- Peter B. Smith, Lage germany
Who is paying for this???
- Jayson, London
I've got a great idea to stop people drinking too much. Don't help them when they are completely out of their heads on booze.
- Sue, Orpington, Kent
Anybody ever consider that "binge drinking" is increasing to fill an ever larger internal void, or is that just me?
- David, Ljubljana, Slovenia
If a booze bus is to run, then make sure the terminus is in an American style booze tank. Then all the binge drinkers can appear before a mgistrate when sober, relieved of their money by way of fines, reducing their ability to binge drink, and reducing the alcohol fueled violence against hard pressed public services
- Alan, carlisle uk
