Former Health Minister Quinton Edness is calling on Government and the community to join forces to save the Island’s air ambulance.The retired United Bermuda Party politician, who was airlifted to the US by Bermuda Air Medivac (BAM) after breaking his neck, said the service should be run through a combination of state subsidy and donations as its expected closure next month would be a great loss.“I would suggest that it would be in the interests of the Government to try and contribute something,” Mr Edness told The Royal Gazette.“I know we always look to Government and Government doesn’t have a bottomless pot but I think in this particular instance it is providing a service for all the residents of Bermuda.“I’d like to see Government provide at least 50 percent and the rest to come from the community.”As previously reported by this newspaper, BAM has not been operating since November and is likely to fold for good in June as it cannot compete with the cheaper foreign air ambulances used by health insurers.Vice-president and chief flight nurse Eloise Bell and her partner Sheldon Smith, one of BAM’s pilots, are looking for an investor with $2 million to buy the plane and relaunch the service.Mr Edness, 81, said he was “very appreciative” of what Ms Bell had done for the community by starting the service seven years ago and saving many lives since.The former Minister was flown to Lahey Clinic in Massachusetts by BAM after suffering a broken neck in an accident two years ago. “The doctors at the hospital here quickly made a decision that I had to be flown out,” he said. “It was touch and go. The service got me up there and got me to the best neurologist.“It was extremely efficient. Eloise herself was the travelling nurse and she was excellent and made all the arrangements to have the ambulance up north meet the plane.“It is a very efficient service for Bermuda. Without it, it takes time for a plane to get here. It’s better if we can have the plane based here in Bermuda.”Mr Edness added: “I think we should, as a community, be doing everything we can to save it and sustain it.”Other patients who’ve used BAM to reach the States for life-saving medical treatment backed Mr Edness’s call.Father-of-two David Barker, 52, of Paget, was rushed to Johns Hopkins in Baltimore by BAM after suffering a heart attack in 2006.He said it took about two-and-a-half hours to get airborne after doctors at King Edward VII decided he needed to go overseas.“If an aeroplane actually had to come in, they’d have a two-hour flight down here plus the preflight stuff once they arrive. You are probably talking a four or five hour turnaround.”Mr Barker, who works in equities, currency and metals for LOM, urged people to think of the air ambulance as a vital service not a business.“The road ambulances that sit down at the hospital: are they classified as business? Maybe something like this could be an adjunct to the hospital. The Government should step in.”Father-of-three Richard Todd, 61, from Hamilton Parish, agreed Government should “most definitely” act to ensure the service keeps going.The shipping company port captain was flown to Johns Hopkins by BAM in 2007 after a heart attack and said: “It was first-class. I think the service should be in existence.”Meanwhile, a wife whose husband desperately needed an air ambulance in order to receive a donor kidney at Brigham & Women’s Hospital in Boston reiterated the need for BAM.The 48-year-old woman, who asked not to be named, said her husband was offered a kidney at 1.30am on March 22 after waiting for one for three years.He needed to get to Brigham by noon that day but his health insurer, Argus, had difficulty getting him a medical plane.“Because the organ was out of the body, the clock was ticking,” said the wife. “It was very frustrating to think we were so close and yet so far away from it.“The only option we had was the commercial flight at 12 o’clock. He went up by Delta and the hospital had a car waiting for us at the airport.”She said her 54-year-old husband, a construction worker from Smith’s, went in for transplant surgery at about 5pm — but the delay meant his body didn’t initially accept the organ and he needed dialysis.“It took a couple of weeks for it to kick in,” she said. “What should have been a five-day hospital stay, ended up being a 12-day hospital stay.“I think if the air ambulance had been on the Island, we could have got here a lot earlier. Maybe some of this could have been prevented.”According to Bermuda Hospitals Board, there were 305 patients from King Edward VII Memorial Hospital transferred overseas using air ambulances in 2011.The Ministry of Health said last week it was concerned there was no on-island service and would “welcome additional investment in the current local service”.It declined to comment further yesterday.