[rootusrootus]

There's a good reason firefighters are cross trained, so it probably does happen in other places too. Go look at the dispatch log for your local fire department. For every fire they put out, there are probably 100 or more medical emergencies, car accidents, etc. They may go for days at a time without seeing anything that even looks like a fire. If the only thing they were allowed to do was fight fires, they'd be idle most of the time.

[chrisseaton]

I think it’s pretty unique to the US. In most places you have a police service, a fire service, and an ambulance service, all separate but working together. Makes sense they’re separate - different roles to specialise in and they move between different locations and leave the scene at different times.

[rtkwe]

The US is largely the same but fire services are sent out to a lot of those because they also have the tools to deal with getting access to patients and making the scene safe for ambulance crews. Sending them out immediately means you don't have to wait for them if the patient's door is locked or their car is all smashed up and you need fire services to peel the car apart to get to them.

[LorenPechtel]

But you actually need police, fire, rescue, and ambulance.

We group fire and rescue together because you sometimes have to get trapped people away from a fire.

[datavirtue]

Incidentally, from my experience helping to manage a fire department payroll and being the son of a nurse, firefighters and nurses are paid about the same for a given area.

I'm not trying to make a point, just provide some context.

[JshWright]

Firefighters yes, paramedics, no...

It's not uncommon for the firefighter/paramedic on the engine who shows up and treats the patient for a few minutes before the ambulance arrives to be making _significantly_ more than the paramedic on the ambulance they hand care over to.

Outside of unionized, municipal departments, paramedic pay in the US is generally pretty abysmal (and well below that of nurses).