The Ontario Professional Fire fighters Association is committed to being part of an Emergency Medical Service that provides the quickest and most efficient response to life and limb threatening medical emergencies to Ontarians.

From time to time, there are distractions that lead to our position being misinterpreted. As such, we need to ensure that our goals and objectives are clear to you, our members.

You should have recently received, mailed directly to your home, an information card regarding the utilization of the fire service in EMS responses in Ontario. The mailing outlined the Ontario Professional Fire Fighters Association’s position, intent, and what we expect the EMS community to say about our advancement in the advocacy of utilizing the fire service to enhance the provision of emergency medical services in the province of Ontario.

We (the OPFFA) want to ensure that our direction, our legislative agenda as it relates to EMS and the fire service is clear, not only to our membership, but to the public, decision makers and those in the EMS field that we work with. Our AGENDA is based on the following fundamental principles:

• Whenever someone in medical distress dials 911, they expect the closest trained emergency responder to be sent as soon as possible, regardless of whether that responder arrives in an ambulance or fire truck.

• The fire service is already strategically placed to respond rapidly to fires or other emergency situations and studies have proven that fire fighters can positively affect the outcome of medical emergencies.

We believe and continue to strive to achieve recognition and implementation of the following:

• Fire fighters, in urban centres, should be dispatched simultaneously with EMS to emergency medical responses that meet local tiered response agreement criteria.

• Fire fighters, in urban centres, should be dispatched to all calls for emergency medical help that involve life and limb threatening medical emergencies. i.e. those that meet EMS Code 4 dispatch criteria. We will continue to work with local Associations, Fire Chiefs, and municipal councils to ensure Tiered Response Agreements reflect this goal.

Ontario’s Paramedics are highly skilled emergency responders who save Ontarians’ lives every day. However, we believe the fire service is positioned to play an increased role in pre-hospital care, which will result in improved emergency medical response to Ontario’s citizens.

The long and the short of it is that the OPFFA strives to ensure that the fire service in Ontario is being utilized to its fullest when it comes to emergency medical services.

To be clear, we (the OPFFA) are not out to take over paramedic responses. We simply want to be part of a system that utilizes both services, to their fullest, to ensure that Ontarian’s are receiving the best care possible, when they dial 911.

In the interest of ensuring that our materials, our position papers, IAFF documents our responses and rebuttals to counter documents by EMS services are fully available to you and the public alike, we have created a new "Fire And EMS" section on our website which contain links to all of the documents and are available for downloading. Please click here or on the "Fire Service & EMS" link near the top of the menu bar to the left.