The emergency services 901, 902, and 903 are daily called by people who need the assistance of rescuers, firefighters, doctors or the police. However, among the callers are persons who joke or pursue evil goals. Representatives of the competent institutions warn that the false calls disrupt the activity of the intervention services. Instead of saving somebody who is in difficulty, the rescuers travel to addresses where no one needs help.
Press officer of the Civil Protection and Emergencies Service Liliana Puscasu has told IPN that 800 to 1,000 calls are made to the service 901 during 24 hours. 20% of them are false. In many cases, the false calls are made by playing children.
Petru Craveţ, who is in charge of relations with the media at the National Emergency Medicine Center, stated for IPN that about 1,000 calls are made to 903 over 24 hours. Of them, about 10 are false. Owing to these calls, the institution incurs additional costs, while persons who really need medical care immediately are offered assistance with delay.
Once, wanting to make a joke, somebody called an ambulance to the address of a friend who was perfectly healthy. In another case, a person informed the operators that Grigory Ivanovich fell off the horse near a Chisinau hotel. When on the spot, the doctors understood that the person who called made a joke as he referred to the monument to political activist Grigory Ivanovich Kotovsky, who is represented on a horse. Inebriated persons also call to 903 as they are bored and want to talk to the operators.
Contacted by IPN, the head of the press service of the Chisinau Police Division Adrian Jovmir said the persons who make false calls can be penalized if the institution files a complaint to the police. In the case of the 902 service, those who make false calls are identified and fined up to 400 lei. In the case of children, there are penalized the parents.
