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Hospital staff wearing mask screen patients with a thermal scanner at the Tan Tock Seng hospitalSINGAPORE: Over 18,000 calls have been made to the H1N1 hotline since it was activated in late April - an average of 450 a day.
About half are prank calls, or people who dialled the number by mistake.
But what happens when there is a genuine case?
It starts with a phone call to the 993 hotline, regarding a suspected case of the H1N1 flu.
The case is routed to the designated ambulance service, and moments later, the crew spring into action.
Civic Ambulance has a fleet of 30 vehicles, of which five can be deployed to pick up cases at any time. Another seven can be activated at short notice, and should the need ever arise, two other ambulance services will be roped in as well, adding a further 10 vehicles to the pool.
The number of despatches has more than doubled since the first case of H1N1 was reported on May 27- from 10 to 25 a day on average.
On Monday alone, Civic Ambulance picked up over 60 cases, the highest so far. Civic Ambulance said numbers tend to spike each time a case is reported.
Civic Ambulance said about 70 per cent of requests come from clinics; it also ferries patients from airports.
Pritpal Singh, operations director, Civic Ambulance, said: "We had a case where this guy was complaining that, why should he go to CDC and get tested when he knows there is nothing wrong with him.
"And last night, we had this very funny case where this guy actually called in, insisted to go to hospital simply because he feels he has got too many American friends."
When the ambulance reaches a housing estate, for example, the lights and siren are switched off. The driver and medic suit up in protective gear, and patients are asked to meet them at the void deck. The point is to be as discreet as they can.
Mr Singh said: "When people get frightened, they all start to call in thinking they are sick. We had a very similar instance like this during SARS when people started to panic. And people called 993 and everybody wanted to go hospital."
On the way to the Communicable Disease Centre (CDC), windows are kept open to minimise the spread of viruses. At the CDC, the patient will undergo tests which will take several hours. - CNA/ms
From ChannelNewsAsia.com; see the source article here.
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