Illustration: Chen Xia/GT

 "It took the ambulance 40 minutes to get to the scene of the accident. There's clearly a shortage of ambulances downtown."

An injured pedestrian had to wait 40 minutes for an ambulance Wednesday morning after he got hit by a car in a neighborhood on Longhua Road West in Xuhui district. The story raised the ire of many people online, who said that 40 minutes was way too long to wait for an ambulance. Fortunately for the injured man, two doctors and a nurse from the nearby Longhua Community Health Center heard about the accident and came to his aid. The Shanghai Medical Emergency Center explained that there was no available ambulance nearby at the time of the accident. Eventually, the center dispatched an ambulance that was posted 8 kilometers away, but it got delayed in heavy traffic. A center employee asked residents to only call for ambulances in actual emergencies and implored drivers to make way for passing emergency vehicles.