NYC faces shortage of EMS crews on Christmas as omicron wave sickens city
By Thomas Tracy and Clayton Guse
New York Daily News |
Dec 25, 2021 at 4:55 PM
All they wanted for Christmas was more help.
The FDNY faced a shortage of EMS crews over the holiday, stretching the department thin as it struggled to respond to a surge of emergency calls made worse by the omicron wave.
Roughly 19% of the city’s more than 4,000 EMS workers were out sick Saturday, Christmas day, up from the typical rate of about 5%, an FDNY spokesman said.
The shortage — caused in part by crews isolating with COVID-19 cases — comes as the city’s daily number of cases continued a record breaking streak.
New York state figures show there were more than 27,000 confirmed cases of the virus in the city in the 24-hour period ending Friday morning, and a positivity rate over 10%. City hospitalization rates, however, remain lower than previous pandemic peaks.
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