A Hobart woman who had to use a taxi to take her teenage son to the hospital because no ambulance was available had to perform CPR on the side of the road with the help of strangers until paramedics arrived.
The family has thanked emergency workers and two passers-by who "saved our boy's life", but wants to see changes so others are not put in the same position.
The 13-year-old boy's stepfather, Dale Cunningham, told the ABC the teenager stopped breathing while he was in a taxi on the way to hospital last week.
He said they had earlier waited nearly 40 minutes for an ambulance to arrive before they were told none was coming.
Mr Cunningham said 37 minutes after the family first called triple-0, an operator called back to tell them no ambulance was available and advised them to call a taxi.
The boy stopped breathing in the taxi and the driver called triple-0.
It took a further 19 minutes for paramedics to arrive on the scene.
The boy's mother performed CPR on her son on the side of the road, until two women who were walking by stopped and took over from her until paramedics arrived.
The Health and Community Services Union, which represents paramedics, said multiple ambulances were ramped at the Royal Hobart Hospital at the time.
Ramping happens when paramedics are forced to wait "on the ramp" outside hospitals because a shortage of hospital beds means the emergency department is too full to transfer patients from ambulances.
While ambulances are ramped, they can't respond to new call-outs.
Family thanks emergency workers, passers-by
Mr Cunningham said the family did not blame emergency workers for what happened but was deeply distressed by the incident.
"The paramedics and police officers were beyond helpful and with the help of those two beautiful ladies no doubt saved our boy's life," he said.
The family says the boy spent seven days in hospital after the incident, including two days on life support in the intensive care unit.
Mr Cunningham said the family wanted to see improvements to the way Tasmania's ambulance and health services were funded and resourced to make sure no other families experienced similar situations.
"From a very young age, we are taught that if we are ever in danger or need medical help to call 000 and help will come. In this situation, they didn't."
Union calls for urgent ramping fix
The Health and Community Services Union's (HASCU) Robbie Moore said Tasmanians should be able to be confident they would get emergency medical treatment when they needed it.
"The whole situation highlights how bad our health system is at the moment and how we need something immediately done to ensure that a situation like this does not happen again," Mr Moore said.
HACSU wants the Tasmanian government to open more beds in the Royal Hobart Hospital to prevent ambulance ramping.
Mr Moore said the Health Department should consider hiring nurses to look after patients in hallways so that paramedics can leave to attend emergency call-outs.
"If we could have nurses treating the seven patients that were there at the time of this incident, it would have meant that an ambulance could have got to that child sooner, and it would have meant a better health outcome for that patient, and for future health patients if we can free up paramedics and get them doing what they're actually meant to do," he said.
In May, Premier and Health Minister Jeremy Rockliff told Budget Estimates that between July 2021 and March this year, ambulances were ramped at Tasmania's major public hospitals 14,399 times.
During that period ambulances spent 20,363 hours ramped.
A Health Department spokesman said Ambulance Tasmania was committed to providing timely and high-quality emergency care and support to people who need it in the community.
