Establishment

The ambulance service is considered one of the basic services that countries are keen to secure and provide to their citizens in order to preserve their lives and to protect the achievements of development, of which the human , if not the most important of them at all, especially since the risks surrounding the human being and the possibility of exposure to various injuries are constantly increasing due to the scientific and technological development and the use of vehicles, modern equipment and machines, which calls for taking all preventive measures, securing assistance, and providing fast and effective ambulance service from the first moments of injury.

The stage of establishing ambulance in civil defense:

In Jordan, since 1956, which is the year of the Jordan Civil Defense was established based on an order from His Majesty the late, the successive administrations of this noble humanitarian body have been keen to develop the ambulance service provided to citizens and to provide all safety requirements for that, at that time, ambulance operations were provided in various ways by primitive and traditional and by unqualified people in this field.

In 1959, with the issuance of the first civil defense law and the assignment of the task of providing ambulance service to injuries resulting from fire and rescue incidents, interest in the issue of first aid began, based on studied scientific foundations, although the level of service was not advanced.

The progress that the world witnessed in the sixties and seventies of the last century in all aspects of life highlighted new dangers threatening human lives and their property, which necessitated the development of the capabilities of the civil defense directorate and its sciences to enable the cadres of this great humanitarian unit to raise the level of their dealings with various incidents and injuries resulting from them.

Historical background

The Acting Minister of Health sent an official  Letter No. 42/1/6/100 dated 4/16/1977 to the Minister of Defense and His Excellency the Minister of Interior, in which it is indicated that there is a problem related to the transfer of injuries and sick cases to hospitals and the provision of immediate services at the scene of the incident due to the distance of hospitals and the small number of Ambulances. the Minister of Interior suggested in this official letter  the formation of a committee to study the ambulance services in the capital in particular and in the Kingdom in general, and to study the capabilities to provide sufficient numbers of them with qualified personnel and the necessary supplies. The government sent a delegation to visit the Emergency Medical Services Center in Tehran with the aim of knowledge  about Iran's experience in this field. The delegation that visited Iran presented a vision to His Excellency the Minister of Health and His Excellency the Minister of Interior represented by proposing the establishment of a general center for first aid and emergency, provided that it was to be in the city of Amman.

10/26/1978 the Minister of Health / Vice President of the Higher Health Council sent an official letter No. 8/19/1323 to each of the Minister of Labor, the Director of Services His Excellency the President of the University of Jordan, the Director General of the Civil Defense and the President of the Doctors Syndicate, he informed them that the Higher Health Council had taken a recommendation to establish emergency services to transfer and treat emergencies and incidents  of all kinds, and that this service was followed to the Directorate of Civil Defense and that a permanent technical supervisory committee be formed for these services in which each from the Ministry of Health, Royal Medical Services, Civil Defense and the Doctors Syndicate, based on a recommendation from the Technical Committee for Ambulance and Emergency, a letter was sent by His Excellency the Minister of Health to the Prime Minister, No. 14/6/2435 dated 24/2/1979, stating that the ambulance and emergency project shall be implemented as part of Civil defense services

Immediate aid establishment stage

In 1979, based on the directives of His Majesty the late King Hussein in view of the increase in the rate of road accidents and deaths resulting from them, a national committee was formed from the Ministry of Health, the Royal Medical Services, the private sector, and the civil defense directorate to study and organize ambulance and emergency services in the Kingdom.

In order to avoid overburdening the state budget and due to the availability of military linkage and control, this committee recommended the establishment of a specialized unit in the civil defense concerned with providing ambulance service in the Kingdom. At that time, the Ambulance and Emergency Directorate was established, which became known as the Immediate Ambulance Directorate.

In 1/8/1979, His Excellency the Minister of Interior issued a decision to establish the Ambulance and Emergency Directorate so that it would be followed to the Directorate of Civil Defense and concerned with providing ambulance services to citizens. During the first three years, it had five centers on the desert roads: Al-Ruwaishid / Al-Safawi / Al-Azraq / Al-Qatraneh / Al-Hasa. This is the expansion of the establishment for other centers and departments on the desert roads with a distance of 50 km between each center and another in the areas extending from Aqaba to the Iraqi borders, Al-Quweira / Al-Ashqaf / Al-Hussainiya / Giza / Al-Muwaqqar / Al-Omari / Bir Mathkour / Grendel / Al-Yarmouk / Sahab Industrial City / Sports City. In addition to the gradual expansion to cover the governorates, cities. During this period, the ambulance service was a distinguished service due to the limited number of incidents, the limited number of centers, and the existence of an independent budget for the Ambulance and Emergency Directorate separate from the budget of the Civil Defense Directorate. After that, the expansion continued with the establishment of ambulance centers and departments, and this coincided with the increase in the number of incidents that the civil defense is required to deal with despite the scarcity of resources, the suspension of the budget allocated to the Ambulance and Emergency Directorate in 1991, and the coverage of its needs by the Directorate of Civil Defense, which negatively affected the development of the ambulance service as required and planned. In pre-prepared projects and studies, it constituted a burden on the Civil Defense, which affected its performance of other duties, as the Ambulance and Emergency Directorate was abolished at the end of 1995 and the ambulance centers were attached to the Civil Defense Directorates.