Not funny: ‘Don’t make prank calls to Rescue 1122’

Emergency officer bemoans bogus calls, say they hinder official work.

FAISALABAD: “There is a great lack of awareness about benefits of Rescue 1122 and responsibilities of the public in reporting emergencies,” Rescue 1122 District Emergency Officer Ehtisham Wahla said on Sunday.

He said in 2014, 77 per cent of the calls received were bogus.

He said objective of the Rescue 1122 service was to help people during emergencies.

Wahla said people who made prank calls to Rescue 1122 often did not realise that the service should only be contacted to report genuine emergencies.



“We are duty-bound to respond to every call,” he said. “Prank calls make it difficult for us to do our job. Rescue workers should not have to wonder whether someone was wasting their time for a practical joke or not.”

He said the time used to address “bogus” calls could be used to address genuine emergencies. Wahla said of the 783,322 calls made to Rescue 1122 in 2014, 605,224 calls prank calls.

He said Rescue 1122 workers had responded to 56,393 calls and had provided on-the-spot medical treatment to 14,577 people and had transported 60,408 patients to various hospitals. The emergency officer said of the total calls, 20,551 were regarding road accidents, 26,815 medical emergencies, 1,137 fires, 3,188 shooting incidents, 65 drowning accidents, 151 falls from heights, 17 cylinder blasts and 4,471 miscellaneous incidents.

He said Rescue 1122 teams had taken 2,452 bodies to mortuaries and 43,379 patients in serious conditions to hospitals. He said the average response time was six minutes.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 29^th, 2014.