** Kentucky based US Army medic killed in Afghanistan
** UK paramedics in Scotland attending on shockingly high numbers of drunk patients
UNITED STATES NEWS
** A US Army medic is dead after being attacked during an escort mission in Afghanistan Wednesday. That is the word from the Associated Press (April 10) which said 101st Airborne Division Spc. John M. Dawson, 22, died from small arms fire in Jalalabad. Dawson was based out of Fort Campbell, Kentucky. The Washington Post (Dan Lamothe/April 10) said Dawson’s death is the first US military casualty in Operation Resolute Support and Freedom’s Sentinel which began January 1. Dawson originally hails from Whitinsville, Massachusetts. He leaves his parents and a brother behind. Funeral services are pending.
UNITED KINGDOM NEWS
** Scottish Ambulance Service paramedics apparently attend on drunken patients once every 21 minutes. That, at least, is the supposition being dangled by The Scotsman (Jamie Beatson/April 10) which said the stat offered by the EMS service itself found that over a 2 year period between 2012-14 prehospital personnel responded to 79,761 calls in which alcohol intoxication was involved. For 2015 so far, the number is 25, 071. A spokesman for the service said while the figures are shocking, unrecorded alcohol related call-outs could push the numbers even higher. As a result of the statistics, several politicians are now advocating for drunk patients to be diverted from A & Es to alcohol recovery centres.
