Watch FDNY Give Sendoff for Pandemic EMS Workers
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FDNY members gathered Thursday at the department's EMS Academy in Fort Totten in Queens to say goodbye to 85 ambulances as they returned to their hometowns after helping for about two months during New York City's COVID-19 outbreak.
A partnership with the Federal Emergency Management Agency sent 250 ambulances and around 500 EMTs and paramedics to help the FDNY with the pandemic. The EMS workers began arriving in the city March 31, and they responded to more than 31,000 medical emergencies during that span.
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“We’ve reached a point where we are able to say farewell to some of the folks that came from across the nation to stand side by side with us to fight this virus," Chief of EMS Operations Lillian Bonsignore said in a statement. "We are eternally grateful for the work that they did. They came to our city to help the people who needed them the most. They fit right in to serve all of those folks that needed our help."
The COVID-19 pandemic has been the busiest period in the history of EMS, according to the FDNY. At the outbreak's height, call volume increased by 50 percent daily.