Complaints rise over Armenia's reformed ambulance service, rights advocate says

Complaints about Armenia’s reformed ambulance service are increasing, the head of a local health rights group claims, citing delays in responding to emergency calls, including cases involving patients with dangerously high blood pressure.

Anush Poghosyan, president of the Right to Health NGO, told Panorama.am on Monday that a recent case involved a citizen whose blood pressure exceeded 200, but whose call for emergency assistance was not handled in a timely manner, despite such cases being classified as high priority.

“Relatives of the citizen, and later I myself, were told that the call was still waiting in the queue,” Poghosyan said.

She added that citizens have reported even more severe situations.

Doctors gathered outside the Armenian National Assembly on Monday to submit a letter to the parliament speaker and all parliamentary factions, calling for hearings on gaps and risks in the country’s universal mandatory health insurance system.

Speaking more broadly about challenges in the healthcare sector and the implementation of universal health insurance, Poghosyan said staffing issues were at the core of the problems.

“Personnel determine everything. Inexperience, indifference and a lack of compassion lead to such situations, because behind every call there is not a task but a person, someone standing between life and death waiting for an ambulance,” she said.

Poghosyan said other systemic problems stem from the same underlying issues.