Emergencies happen; they&8217;re just a fact of life. But most of us are used to being able to quickly summon help. That&8217;s what an Adams County resident thought would happen on Sunday night when that person called for help. A man had collapsed and needed medical attention. Seconds turned into minutes. Minutes passed, yet no help arrived.

The problem, it seems, is a slightly flawed system with perhaps deadly consequences. For years the county has dispatched ambulances using a rotation system, an attempt to be fair to competing providers.

On Sunday one of the two main providers, Metro Rural Services, was given the call but didn&8217;t have an ambulance available so the company transferred the call to a third ambulance company, Emergystat. That company had recently pulled itself out of the emergency calls rotation due to inadequate personnel. The Emergystat crew apparently got lost, arriving after some 40 minutes had ticked off the clock. The collapsed man died prior to the crew&8217;s arrival.

We may never know if the man&8217;s life could have been saved with a faster response.

But the county should reconsider the rotation system and attempt to seal up the gap into which the collapsed man fell on Sunday night. Perhaps quality of service and speed of response would increase by going with a single ambulance provider.