In 2023, the number of emergency calls at the integrated control centers in Bavaria increased, while the rescue services recorded fewer operations. As the Ministry of the Interior announced, around 3.5 million emergency calls were received via 112 in the Free State in 2023, almost half a million more than in the previous year. The number of rescue missions fell by around 25,000 to around 1.91 million. The statistics therefore did not include ambulance and patient transport as well as fire service operations.
The Interior Ministry’s statistics include all 26 integrated control centers in Bavaria. The Bavarian Red Cross (BRK), which says it operates eight of the control centers, also recorded a noticeable increase in emergency calls. In contrast, the number of operations fell by around four percent. “More and more people are turning to the emergency number 112 even though there is no actual emergency,” said BRK state manager Elke Frank. In many cases, 116 117, where the medical on-call service can be reached, is the more suitable number.
According to BRK spokesman Sohrab Taheri-Sohi, the employees in the control centers use computer-aided procedures to recognize earlier whether a rescue operation is not necessary despite an emergency call. If a caller still insists that it is an emergency, in many cases help has to be mobilized even though it is not necessary.
There is currently no legal certainty for dispatchers to reject an emergency call, said Taheri-Sohi. Employees could potentially be guilty of failing to provide assistance. The BRK therefore called for legal certainty for dispatchers in the control centers. There are currently initial approaches to solving this in a test control center using artificial intelligence for emergency call recording and logging. The BRK hopes that if the test is successful, more unnecessary operations could be avoided in the future and the resources of the emergency services could be conserved.