The Region : Paramedic Proposal Hit

Putting emergency medical service on a voluntary subscription basis in the city of Los Angeles would provide neither greater revenue for paramedic service nor a higher quality of service, a Fire Department report said. In fact, ambulance costs would probably go up, Fire Chief Donald O. Manning said. “When people pay for something they tend to call on it a lot more, and their calls, conservatively, would double,” he added. The report grew out of a City Council request to study a plan for asking residents to subscribe voluntarily on a flat fee basis for paramedic and emergency medical services that would cover an unlimited number of ambulance calls or transportation yearly. The annual cost for each of the city’s 1.2 million residences would be $16.40, the report said. It also asserted that 40% of the city’s residents have medical insurance that already meets such costs, and that 25% of the residents “cannot or will not pay” for the current emergency medical care.