The legislative amendment concerning paramedic nurses contains two new legal provisions: poliisi- tai hälytystoiminnan vaikeuttaminen (“interference with police or emergency services”) (chapter 16, section 3a of the Criminal Code) and the lesser offence of poliisi- tai hälytystoiminnan haittaaminen (“minor interference with police or emergency services”) (chapter 16, section 3b of the Criminal Code). These provisions already have a nickname, too: sinivilkkusabotaasi (“blue beacon sabotage”).
The new provisions are a great success: the threats and violence faced by paramedic nurses are now more punishable than before.
So the violence and threats faced by paramedic nurses are finally recognised separately in legislation, which is something that Tehy has long been seeking and pushing for. In future, violence or threats of violence encountered by paramedic nurses will primarily be considered crimes of “interference with police or emergency services”. The penalties for it are as severe as those for violent resistance to a public official, for example.
This means that assaulting paramedic nurses will in future be as serious an offence as assaulting a police officer or doctor on duty, for example. This is an important and welcome change. At Tehy, we have long argued that it is completely absurd to value professionals operating in the same situation differently. Often, the police are also called to the scene of a dangerous prehospital emergency medical services assignment, and aggressive behaviour is directed at everyone present.
Other health and social services left out
However, the new legislation also has shortcomings.
Firstly, the new provisions are only applicable to paramedic nurses, with the rest of the health and social services sector falling outside their scope. While paramedic nurses do often face a violence and threats of violence in their work, the same is true for other health and social services professionals as well. According to a survey commissioned by Tehy (from 2021, report in Finnish), the most violent workplaces in the health and social services sector are in monitoring and inpatient wards, where 92% and 91% of respondents have experienced violence or the threat of violence. In psychiatry, the corresponding figure is 88%. In prehospital emergency medical services, 80% of respondents have experienced violence or the threat of violence.
I assist Tehy members in criminal trials, which is also one of the reasons why I can subscribe to the notion that there is no such thing as a 100% safe and non-violent workplace in the health and social services sector. That is why we at Tehy are very disappointed that these new provisions were demarcated by hospital doors. A person who behaves in a threatening manner towards paramedic nurses often continues to do so in the emergency room as well.
The demarcation is particularly unfortunate and even contradictory because the Finnish Government has set itself the goal of improving the occupational safety and legal protection of care and rescue personnel in work-related situations involving violence to correspond with the legal protection of
public officials (page 76 of the Government Programme). Despite this, the scope of the new provisions was reduced to be applicable to prehospital emergency medical services staff only.
High application threshold – read the examples
Secondly, I raise the concern that is the application threshold of the new provisions too high for prehospital emergency medical services staff?
The provisions require emergency services to be obstructed or substantially interfered with. Even the lesser offence requires the act to cause interference to emergency services. This approach does not take into account paramedic nurses personally, and the consequences suffered by paramedic nurses, for example, do not indicate whether the criteria for the offence are fulfilled, i.e. whether emergency services were obstructed or substantially interfered with.
Let's take an example. Paramedic nurses arrive on a scene, and the treatment of an initially cooperative patient turns into a violent struggle in the back of the ambulance, resulting in a paramedic nurse twisting their ankle, forcing them to go on sick leave. However, by this point, the ambulance has already arrived at the hospital door. To be applicable, the provisions require emergency services to be obstructed of substantially interfered with. Is this condition fulfilled in this instance?
What if we change the example so that the patient in the ambulance is not violent, but makes a serious death threat to the paramedic nurses, emphasising the threat with a hand gesture of shooting a paramedic nurse in the forehead? In this case, the patient is still successfully transported to further treatment despite the threat, but the threatened paramedic nurse later has to go on long sick leave.
The paramedic nurses who are members of Tehy are professionals at helping and interacting with people in very different situations. They are capable of tackling aggressive and extremely challenging behaviour, even if it has escalated to violence, so that the perpetrator can be transported for further treatment. It is clear that in the situations described above, the paramedic nurses have suffered serious consequences. But are the consequences also serious for emergency services, which is what the provisions ultimately protect? The emergency assignments were successfully completed, so emergency services were not obstructed at least. But were they substantially interfered with?
The government proposal concerning the provisions offers a hand-wringing answer: “Violence and threats usually at least substantially interfere with the services.” (HE 71/2025 p. 46).
These issues will be assessed by the courts in the future, and it will take years before the legal situation is settled and we have clarity on the threshold for the application of these provisions.
The examples described above are no mere figments of my imagination, but real situations that happened to paramedic nurses who are members of Tehy. The two cases were tried in district court, the first as assault and the second as illegal threat. Given the unfortunate extent to which this type of threatening and violent behaviour occurs, I would have preferred the new provisions to be clear enough from the outset that their application to all threats and violence encountered by prehospital emergency medical services staff would be clear.
Penalties alone do not increase safety
Finally, I cannot help pointing out that the best safeguards against threats and violence are training, anticipation and the exchange of information and cooperation between authorities. Harsher penalties contribute to the protection brought about by a change in societal attitudes, but unfortunately these new provisions of the Criminal Code are just a drop in the bucket in terms of the work for a more non-violent health and social services sector.