Winnipeg paramedics are enrolling in a one-day course in self-defence -- joining emergency medical services personnel elsewhere in protecting themselves against a growing threat of on-the-job violence.
Still, the union that represents approximately 220 paramedics in this city says the course should be longer and measures to protect paramedics could be tougher.
"Even the instructor teaching the course said a decent course would be about five days long," said Bryan Leach, health and safety committee representative of the Professional Paramedic Association of Winnipeg.
The one-day optional course doesn't cover enough self-defence techniques or give participants the required time to practise what they learn, Leach added.
Paramedics began taking the one-day sessions in the course last month. City officials said training for all personnel who enrolled in the course should be completed by fall. They maintained the aim of the course was awareness of self-defence techniques rather than knowledge of complicated manoeuvres.
The course is a response to the growing number of cases of violence that paramedics encounter. In Winnipeg last October, an EMS supervisor was parked on the side of a road doing paperwork, when he was pulled from his car and assaulted by an intoxicated man, Leach said.
That incident proved to be the catalyst that provoked local authorities to introduce the self-defence course.
Beyond that, paramedic union leaders will push for body armour to be introduced as standard equipment, Leach said, adding half of union members in Winnipeg would support such a measure. However, 25 per cent of paramedics don't want body armour, he said.
Leach attributed opposition to introducing body armour for paramedics as "old-school thinking," an acknowledgement by some members that violence is part of a paramedic's job.
joe.paraskevas@freepress.mb.ca
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