142 new ambulances for city from Aug

Mumbai: Lack of space is proving to be a major hurdle in stationing state-of-the-art ambulances in the city. The state public health department wants to deploy 142 out of the 937 ambulances it will procure under the Emergency Medical Services project in the city and suburbs. The traffic department has offered space at 25 of itsoffices acrossthecity. 

    "We want to ensure that 142 are deployed so that we can reach any accident spot in less than 20 minutes,'' publichealth minister Suresh Shetty said. 
    The ambulances, to be deployed from August, will look different and will have a unique siren. The health department has told the traffic department to prepare an awareness campaign on the ambulances and the need to givethem rightof way. 
    Each ambulance, costing Rs6 lakh, will have life-saving equipment certified by European or American government associations and an ayurvedic doctor on board. The annual maintenance cost is estimated atRs12lakh. 
    London's fleet service has 700 ambulances.