You know, I’m going to get real here. None of you know what actual extraordinary risk is. You go to work, same as we all do, and accept “normal” risks, like crashes and maybe getting sick. And I get it. I really do. I do the same thing. Yes, I could die or be seriously ill or injured as a result of my work in EMS, same as any other job. But there is no oath, no solemn vow, and no certainty to those fears. It’s a job. A job that pretty much universally treats you as an ultimately-replaceable cog in the greater system. And because it’s fun, rewarding and generally meaningful, I keep doing it. Same as y’all. And there’s hazards encountered in that. Storms. Floods. Fires. Violence. Fatigue. Part of the job, I agree. No one asked me to wade into floodwater to go get Grandma out, and I willingly accepted that risk without a second thought because we had an OK plan and could pull it off relatively safely. I accept the risk involved in routine EMS.
But then “different” hazards show up. Coronavirus, for starters. Dangerous, frequent and potentially lethal. It’s not the flu, and “leaders” like Sir Douglas Haig and some of y’all draw false equivalence to routine risks and claim it’s all “part of the job”. Guess what, it’s not. There is no oath or affirmation or obligation to put oneself in danger to perform as a paramedic, and yet, we’re putting ourselves in extraordinary danger every day, without adequate protective systems, training, equipment or even plans, and relying on hope and inadequate PPE. And we know it’s inadequate because our Chinese and Italian and now American brothers and sisters have died and are dying of this virus and there’s an excellent chance they were exposed while working as we do with the same inadequate training and equipment and systems. So that’s bad. In the military, peculiar hazards that cannot be entirely or effectively mitigated are compensated for by hazard pay, by a solemn commitment to care for the veteran and lifetime disability compensation, and by a large check and honors if they die. And it’s barely enough. But it’s way, way more than any of our employers offer. Would any EMS employer pay 100% of someone’s highest income for the rest of their life, tax-free, if they’re injured and disabled? Disability compensation? I doubt it.
And what do you do? “Oh, it’s your job, be glad you have one?” You know what? Most Americans are about to get some pretty substantial welfare and debt cancellation and will grit their way through this and they’ll promptly forget public service in general and us in particular when it’s over. And our industry will continue to spend as little as possible because people like you will take a sense of “duty” as the extra $10 an hour we should be getting.
Clearly you’re more altruistic and better people than I am, but I think that if a community wants me to risk my life to help them in their hour of need, they ought to pay appropriately for it and to a degree that compensates for the danger of that work. That you argue against that is baffling to me. And yes, I’m angry at you, because you want all of the noble trappings of good and righteous and honorable organizations and a profession while paying lip service at best to the solemn and costly obligations underlying those traditions, and you undermine the entire case for developing such a culture of responsibility by offering to provide EMS for costs so low people never have to think about it because “it’s not their problem”.
You don’t want to pay hazard pay? Fine, show us your isolation suits, full-face self-contained respirators and cleaning solutions that decon the whole truck. Show us the robust, meaningful support and rehabilitation system there to make injured employees whole. Show us the compensation scheme to ensure someone’s family is taken care of adequately to begin to let yourself believe you did the best you could as a leader to make their loved ones sacrifice worthwhile. But until that’s there, I think it’s appropriate to at least consider paying someone more than $9 an hour to respond to EMS calls in the middle of a pandemic.
But that’s hard and people like Easy. Beating their chests about warm zones and active shooters and how smart and cool they are. Woo. Color me impressed.
And yeah, I am jaded. I’m also a better paramedic than most of you and don’t really have an abundance of concern for what random Internet dudes think. And I have no desire to fly, to work for some podunk little EMS service that pays its people poorly, or to sink into the mediocrity that some of y’all clearly think is the best thing ever.
