Paramedics equipped with bodycams amid mounting concern for staff safety

Paramedics are to be equipped with body cameras.

Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt said the move would help protect them from assaults and bring the attackers to justice.

It comes amid mounting concern about attacks on NHS staff in England, with 15 per cent suffering physical violence from patients or their families over the past year.

In the past 12 months, 352 prosecutions were brought over attacks on ambulance staff, but experts fear this is only a fraction of the total incidents. There are already plans to double the maximum jail sentence for attacks on emergency workers from six months to one year.

Mr Hunt said: ‘Abuse against healthcare workers goes against everything the NHS stands for. We want to do everything we can to prevent physical and verbal abuse. Issuing paramedics with body cameras will help protect them and increase prosecutions.’

The body cameras will be piloted in 465 ambulances and their paramedics, with plans to eventually provide all paramedics with the devices.

Mr Hunt added: ‘The NHS is consistently rated as the thing that makes us most proud to be British, but it’s not the institution or buildings the public is so passionate about – it’s the people on the frontline. Staff have been under huge pressure and have never worked harder. In these challenging circumstances, they need to know the NHS is striving to be the best employer it can be.’

Former senior Metropolitan Police officer Lord Paddick last week revealed how an ambulance called to help a 13-year-old girl in cardiac arrest had been ambushed in Eastleigh, Hampshire.

‘It was a false call and an ambush. 

‘The ambulance crew was attacked with bricks, chairs and bottles by the attackers who had lain in wait.’