Since the beginning of the coronavirus outbreak, residents of hard-hit New York City have been talking about ambulance sirens, and how the wailing never seems to stop.
They’re not imagining things — but the reality is even grimmer than some may have guessed. A huge number of those ambulances are responding to fatal or near-fatal heart attacks suffered by New Yorkers whose true health issue may be COVID-19.
Emergency Medical Services, the part of the fire department that runs the city’s paramedic response, is currently responding to three or four times its average daily amount of cardiac calls, with each individual call almost twice as likely to involve a death.
According to the FDNY, it means there are more patients calling 911 closer to death, and many more of them dying despite the best efforts of EMTs and paramedics before they ever reach a hospital.
New York State suffers deadliest day since COVID-19 outbreak
April 7, 202007:37“The dramatic increase of cardiac arrest calls and deaths from cardiac arrest calls,” said a senior FDNY official, “demonstrates the impact suspected or confirmed COVID-19 patients are having on 911 and what EMS members are having to respond to every day.”
NBC News was provided with raw numbers by FDNY data analysts who have been comparing the number of cardiac arrest calls this year to last year. The difference is stark.
To EMS, a cardiac call is a 911 call in which a patient is either dead of cardiac arrest or very close to it. “Death on a call” means the person was found with obvious signs of death when the ambulance arrived, like rigor mortis, or couldn’t be resuscitated after the paramedics arrived.
From March 20 to April 5, 2019, there were an average 69 cardiac calls a day in New York City, with an average of 27 deaths, meaning 39 percent of the calls.
For the same time period this year, there were an average 195 cardiac calls a day with an average of 129 deaths, meaning 66 percent of those calls involved a death.
The difference has become more pronounced as the disease has spread.
From March 30 to April 5, 2019, there were an average 69 calls a day for cardiac patients and 26 deaths, meaning 38 percent of the calls.
For March 30 to April 5, 2020 – the week ending Sunday — there were an average 284 cardiac calls a day with 200 deaths a day. Seventy-two percent of the calls ended in death.
The numbers for Sunday, April 5, were the highest yet. Out of 322 cardiac calls, 241, or almost 75 percent, ended in death.
Capt. Jing Kong, a 16-year EMS veteran, said via the FDNY’s official Instagram account, “I know crews that go from cardiac arrest to cardiac arrest all day.”
According to the FDNY, many of this year's cardiac calls also involve notations that the patient is suffering or has suffered fever and cough, but the precise percentage is unknown.
Sunday is the most recent day for which the FDNY provided data.
