Paramedic suspended after being filmed dancing in uniform at techno festival where two people died
A paramedic has been suspended after he was filmed dancing at a music festival where two young people died of drug overdoses.
The man was on a sanctioned break at the Defqon.1 festival when he started dancing in front of festival-goers.
In the viral clip, he is seen showing off his moves while still wearing his uniform and high-visibility vest. His colleague stands in the background, leaning on a tree with his arms folded.
MS Event Medical director Mike Hammond confirmed that although the man was on break and there “were no medical emergencies taking place” when he started dancing around 6.15pm, his career was now in jeopardy.
'He made a simple mistake by not removing his uniform before taking his break in a public area,' he said.
According to News.com.au, the medic had begged for the video to be taken down after it made it onto the popular Instagram page.
“Hey bro I’m the medic in that video you posted. I’m in real danger of losing my career over that video so I was hoping you could do me a huge favour and take it down,” the man reportedly wrote.
“I know it’s pretty funny, but I’ve put years of hard work into being a paramedic so I’d really appreciate it.”
The decision to suspend the worker followed the deaths of Western Sydney man Joseph Pham, 23, and a 21-year-old woman from Melbourne.
Police said 10 people were charged with drug supply offences and 700 revellers sought medical assistance at the event.
In a press conference, New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian vowed to permanently shut down the festival declaring it “unsafe”.
'I'm absolutely aghast at what's occurred. I don't want any family to go through the tragedy that some families are waking up to this morning,' she said.
'This is an unsafe event and I'll be doing everything I can to make sure it never happens again.
She added that Australia needed to "provide solutions in terms of potential education, [and] to say to people it is not ok to have this increase in culture [where] it is ok to have illegal drugs and try something that you don’t know the source of”.
