European 112 Day

Every year, on February 11, the EU puts its Single Emergency Number 112 in the spotlight

Mihai Pelin, 11.02.2020, 13:50

February 11 is the European 112 Day. In Romania, the single emergency telephone number, managed by the Special Telecommunications Service, was introduced in 2004. An operator takes over the call, conducts a preliminary interview, indexes the case in keeping with the category it falls under and then transfers the call to either the fire department, the ambulance, the police or another intervention unit.

Major Catalin Chirca, who is a spokesperson for the Special Telecommunications Service, gave details in an interview for Radio Romania:

Last year alone, the 112 centers took over some 11.3 million calls. Following their classification and after establishing the level of emergency of each of them, it was concluded that half of them were real emergencies. Also, we should mention the fact that out of the total number of 112 calls, some 55% required medical intervention. People asked for help from the ambulance, and of course, the urgent calls were transferred to such services. In 2018, less than 10 million people called 112.

Unfortunately, there are many citizens who call 112 just because they experience dizziness or headaches, often because they had too much to drink. Authorities recommend that 112 should be called only when there is a real emergency.

Here is now the coordinator of the National Department for Emergency Situations, Raed Arafat:

There are calls that require the sending of a helicopter to the place of an accident, and sometimes they prove to be fake calls. Such calls affect the entire emergency system and we hope their number will drop, because people must understand that such resources are extremely expensive and we cannot play with them. It’s extremely expensive to send a helicopter or any other means of transport to a case that actually does not exist; money, lives, risks are involved.

The new technologies involving the use of smart phones provide emergency services with the capacity to establish the exact location of the caller, either by means of a text or via a GPS or other wi-fi applications. According to statistics, in Romania, the average response time of the 112 service is 3.9 seconds and it was registered in 93.6% of the total calls for which the response time was under 10 seconds, thus placing the rate at European level. In Romania, one can call 112 on a landline or mobile phone, including on mobile phones that do not have SIM cards. People with disabilities can contact the emergency service by sending a text to 113.