No suitable care for firefighters with PTSD

The Netherlands does not provide adequate care for firefighters with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) as a result of the trauma they suffered during their work, Zembla reports after research. Firefighters have to seek help themselves or fight their employers in court for aid. And those who drop out as a result face salary cuts because, unlike the police and Defnese, the fire department does not recognize PTSD as an occupational disease.

According to official figures, only a handful of Dutch firefighters have PTSD. However, international research indicates that the actual number should be closer to 1,500. Firefighters don’t only save people from burning buildings. They also search for drowning victims, handle suicides, and cut people from car wrecks, among other things. Since 2006, the fire department also responds to resuscitations because it has a shorter response time than the ambulance. Zembal discovered that the fire brigade currently performs the most resuscitations by far of all the emergency services.

In Amsterdam and Rotterdam alone, firefighters did around 2,000 resuscitations last year. “When I say goodbye to people before their retirement, they have sometimes experienced over 1,500 resuscitations,” Amsterdam fire chief Tijs van Lieshout told Zembla. That includes babies and small children. In about 80 percent of resuscitations, the victim dies. Van Lieshout acknowledged that traumatized firefighters have been receiving insufficient help for years. “It has been that way for 20 years. That is a bitter conclusion.”

Currently, most of the 25 Dutch security regions have no insight into the number of firefighters with PTSD in their brigade. The exception is Amsterdam-Amstelland, which launched a temporary “leniency arrangement” for people with PTSD in 2022 so that these firefighters won’t face salary cuts. According to Van Lieshout, 43 firefighters have registered for that scheme. Noordoost-Gelderland and Twente both told Zembla they know of three cases, and Friesland said it referred 13 firefighters with possible PTSD symptoms for help in the past two years. Haaglanden counted seven suspected cases in the last five years.

According to lawyer Vincent Dolderman, who specializes in PTSD in the police and Defense, the security regions have violated their duty of care as employers by not providing firefighters with adequate support. He recently initiated a lawsuit holding the security regions liable on behalf of 10 firefighters who suffered PTSD during their work at the fire brigade. He receives new reports every week, he told Zembla.

Zembla spoke to firefighters, lawyers, trade unions, and security offices, among others, for its research.