THE story of the man forced to wait more than seven hours for an ambulance is the latest example of the crisis within our ambulance service.

It's hard to imagine the agony 70-year-old Brian Gatehouse was in after his doctor asked for him to be taken to hospital by ambulance.

Although the initial call was not to 999, it was later upgraded to a full emergency and it was still another three-and-a-half hours before one arrived.

His condition was so severe that he required an emergency operation for his kidney stones.

It is the latest in a long line of stories we have carried on failings within the Welsh Ambulance Service.

It must be made clear that front-line staff are not to blame for what is obviously an organisational problem.

There is clearly a lack of ambulances covering our area and this needs to be addressed at the highest level as soon as possible.

Only yesterday we spoke of the inability of the service to cope with demand after A&E departments were set targets of getting patients out of ambulances on arrival within 15 minutes.

Clearly what health minister Edwina Hart must also look at is response times in Gwent.

It is only a matter of time before someone dies because of a delay in getting an ambulance to them.

It would be a scandal for just one life to be lost and those in charge must take action now and resolve this issue before they are left with a death on their conscience and a family is without a loved one because of a less-than-average service.