North West Ambulance Service, which covers Greater Manchester, has been named in a new study as the trust worst-hit by sickness absence rates due to long Covid in the country.
The data was gathered and has now been published by the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Coronavirus as paramedics in Greater Manchester and England and Wales prepare to take strike action on Wednesday. The cross party MPs used the Freedom of Information Act to survey all 10 ambulance service NHS Trusts in England.
The group said the results showed that between October 2021 and October this year, an estimated 166,760 calendar days were lost due to staff experiencing Covid-related sickness more than 28 days after contracting the virus. Of the trusts that responded, NWAS recorded the highest absence rate, with 42,281 days of absence taken due to long Covid over the period, revealed the study.
All-Party Parliamentary Groups - or APPGs - are informal cross-party groups that have no official status within Parliament. They are run by and for members of the Commons and Lords.
Following the study's findings, MPs have called on the Government to 'recognise' long Covid as an occupational disease and introduce support for key workers They said the data reveals the availability of ambulance staff across England remains badly affected, with hundreds of thousands of staff absent due to the condition for four weeks or more.
On average, the study said 129 staff members were absent from work across the 10 trusts from October 2021 to October 2022 due to the condition. Last year, NHS ambulance trusts in England reported losing an estimated average of 5,322 days per month to long Covid.
The APPG's MPs said those figures were now getting worse. "The findings suggest that long Covid is compounding a myriad of other factors which are reducing the availability of NHS staff," said a statement.
According to the most recent ONS statistics an estimated 2.2 million (3.4 per cent of the population) are living with long Covid. Since first highlighting the issue in August 2020, the APPG on Coronavirus has been calling on the government to recognise long Covid as an occupational disease and to provide formal guidance to employers."
Health minister Will Quince, meanwhile, said today that individual NHS trusts were putting in place contingencies ahead of Wednesday’s ambulance strike. The Health Secretary, Steve Barclay, will also meet unions representing striking ambulance drivers in 11th hour talks later on Tuesday, although the discussions are not expected to avert the action.
Caroline Lucas, MP for Brighton Pavilion and Vice-Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Coronavirus, said: "When it comes to the availability of ambulance staff it really is a matter of life or death and these statistics highlight the devastating impact long Covid is having on our emergency services which are already facing unprecedented pressure.
"Frontline workers exposed themselves to the virus while saving others during the pandemic and the government cannot continue to ignore their sacrifice. They must recognise the condition as an occupational disease and drastically increase funding for research into treatments."
The All-Party Parliamentary Group on Coronavirus is conducting a cross-party parliamentary inquiry into the Government's handling of the pandemic and has so far held over 30 hearings and made over 50 recommendations.
North West Ambulance Service has been approached for comment.
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