‘Wake-up call’ after ambulance calls rise during hot weather

The figures were shared during a West Sussex County Council scrutiny committee meeting on Wednesday, September 16.

Lara Waywell, divisional director of operations at SECAmb NHS Foundation Trust, said it had been a ‘very challenging time’ for staff and patients, with many hospitals ‘not built to withstand that level of heat’.

And Nicky Relf, head of operations for the Worthing area, said the heat had made people ‘really unwell’, with calls not just coming from those who may have been out in the sun for too long.

The trust declared a critical incident between June 25 and 29 following a period of ‘significant demand’. There was a 16 per cent increase between June 22 and July 12, when compared with the same period in 2025.

Martin McCabe (Lab, Worthing West) said there had been 199 heat-related incidents on a single day in Worthing, with handover times from the ambulances to hospitals increasing.

Ms Relf said: “I worked very closely with Worthing Hospital. They had lots of issues where they had to close wards because they were too hot, which then just added to the issues that we had with our handover.

“I’ve been in the ambulance service for 25 years and it’s not something I’ve ever seen or had to work through [before].”

Mr McCabe postulated the idea of a ‘joined up county-wide approach’ between the council, the NHS and other public bodies to dealing with the issues brought about by extreme heat.

Ms Weywell said joined up working was ‘always a good thing’ and that she would be happy to discuss how that might look in the future. She also stressed the need to work on how to prevent people from getting sick due to hot weather.

Speaking after the meeting, Mr McCabe said: “For me, that is a wake-up call. Extreme heat isn’t just an environmental issue, it’s a public health issue, an NHS issue and an emergency resilience issue.”