Whenever a child dials 999, the operator comes on line as the call is connected, telling us that they’re connecting a call from a child. This is because about 90% of calls from children are the little devils playing with mobile phones. Mums and dads — please keep mobiles out of reach of little hands! On Christmas Day it seemed we spent half the day ringing back mobiles and trying to trace their owners, only to find some small person had got carried away with their new “toy”.

Anyway, yesterday the operator came on line telling me there was a child on line, and then there was silence. I was fully expecting this to be the usual child playing scenario, since when children do make genuine calls, they are actually a lot better at it and calmer than adult callers.

“What’s the problem? What’s happened?” I said, for the third time, and finally a little voice started to speak.

“Can you come? Mummy’s cut her wrists and there is blood everywhere!”

Oh hell, I thought, not a child playing after all. Unless it’s one with a really sick sense of humour.

“Yes, we can come,” I said “what’s your address?”

“Don’t know!” said the child. “I rang my uncle and he told me not to call you and that if I did I would get in trouble!”

This was just getting better and better. I sensed the child was scared to give me her address because of what her uncle had said, but after a bit of coaxing, she provided the name of a hotel, the fact that it was in London and a room number. Unfortunately, she had a bit of a lisp, so when she said “four thirteen” I thought she said “floor thirteen” and asked her for the room number again.

“I already told you, four thirteen! Aren’t you listening?” she said indignantly, which would have made me laugh if it hadn’t been such a dire situation. Children sound really amusing when they are trying to be authoritive.

“Okay, you’re doing really well,” I said, “now I just need to know the street name and which part of London it’s in — do you know that?”

(Damn our stupid mapping system that doesn’t have things like hotels on it…)

“No!” wailed the child breaking into noisy sobs “my uncle said you wouldn’t come! You’re not coming, are you?”

“Yes!” I said, trying not to panic — the sound of a small child in such obvious distress not helping much — “of course we’ll find you, we’ll look everywhere until we do, but if we knew a bit more of the address we’d find you faster.”

“Mu-MMMMEEEEE!” screeched the child. “MUUUUUMMEEEEEEEEEEE!!! Come here Mummy! Come here Mummy!”

Eventually a woman came to the phone and I asked her for the address.

“Salright,” she said in a slurred voice “m’okay, jussssht fine. Don’ send the umblunce, mmfine.”

“Just let us send someone round to see if you’re okay?” I asked, but the phone went down.

Now, according to Nee Naw Service policy, if the patient refuses an ambulance we are not supposed to send one, even if they are dying in a horrible way. This is because everyone has the right to refuse medical treatment, unless they are sectioned under the mental health act, which is not something that can be done on the spot. I decided that I was going to conveniently forget about this rule, and with the help of the operator, who found the phone’s approximate location, and Directory Enquiries, I found the address of the hotel and off went the nee naw and the police.

The ambulance crew got there first and someone, probably the child, let them in. They reported back to us that the patient had been self harming and was very drunk, and the child was only five years old. This shocked me; I had assumed she was older. I’m useless at telling kids’ ages from their voices, and even if they are stood in front of me I am not much better, but from the maturity displayed in her language and the way she took charge of the situation I would have put her at about ten. The patient was refusing hospital, but after the police arrived everything went quiet for a while and then the ambulance set off for the hospital, so she must have changed her mind.

I hope they both got the help that they needed.

I’m not particularly fond of children and the plight of a child in need doesn’t usually tug my heartstrings in the same way as a frail elderly person or a puppy with an injured paw, but I’ve been thinking about this poor little girl a lot. When I was five life was all Transformers, Scalectrix and pretending to be a superhero and I don’t think I knew that self harming even existed.

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