In Petropavl, employees of the regional ambulance station have been forced to work for years in a building that was never intended for medical staff — it once housed a stable. The old structure fails to meet sanitary requirements and has long needed replacement, the website infohub.kz reports.
According to Channel Seven, several medics are crammed into cramped offices, and the building itself, as employees put it, "is literally falling apart." There are no proper conditions for the staff to work effectively.
"You saw my office, right? The senior paramedic and I sit there together. We should have separate offices, essentially. But since there's no space, we have to sit almost on each other's laps. And every spring the roof leaks, because it's beyond repair. This place was originally meant for horses — it was a stable," said Yekaterina Sotnikova, head of the paramedic unit.
The center also lacks parking spaces for ambulances: the garage can only hold 18 of the 25 vehicles. Drivers say winter is especially hard — they practically never turn off diesel vehicles in severe frost, which leads to additional costs.
"There are many cars, the cars are long, the garage is small. That's just how it is — there's not enough space for everyone, so we leave them outside. Sometimes paramedics complain that the cars are cold. Diesels, for example, may stay running, while petrol ones warm up quickly," said driver Yaroslav Golovin.
The problem in Petropavl has been raised for years. The city has never had a dedicated building for the ambulance service. To address this, private houses in the Kopay microdistrict were demolished and construction of a new complex began. More than 6 billion tenge has been allocated for the construction, with 90% of the funds coming from the republican budget. A 1.5-hectare plot was set aside for the future complex.
"A four-story building, with a garage for 20 ambulances, including a warehouse for spare parts, fuel and lubricants, and so on. The administrative building will be fully equipped to international medical standards. There will also be a conference hall and a simulation training center for training sessions and professional development," said Gulnar Kaliyeva, press secretary of the North Kazakhstan Region Health Department.
Construction of the new complex began very recently. If everything goes according to schedule, the station will welcome its first employees and begin operations in November next year.