First Aid Facts
- A blocked airway can kill someone in three to four minutes, but it can take more than eight minutes for an ambulance to arrive. So a simple procedure such as opening someone’s airway can save their life whilst waiting for emergency help to arrive.
- Thousands of people are dying each year in situations where first aid could have made the difference; this includes nearly 900 people who choke to death, 2’500 who asphyxiate from a blocked airway and 29’000 who die from heart attacks.
- A recent statistic, released by St John’s Ambulance, has revealed that 140’000 people die each year in the UK from incidents where first aid could of possibly saved their lives.
- Nearly two-thirds of people (59%) within the UK wouldn’t feel confident enough to even try and save a life, and a further quarter of these people (24%) would do nothing and wait for an ambulance to arrive or even hope that a passerby would know the correct first aid required.
- The use of CPR dates all the way back to 1740, yet even today, many individuals don’t know how to perform it. Given properly and immediately to sudden cardiac arrest victims, CPR can save lives.
- In 2009, ‘Mother and Baby Magazine’ fulfilled a Save A Life Survey; after this survey was conducted it showed that a massive 82% out of 2’000 questioned parents with young children would not know what to do if their child started choking, was burned or even stopped breathing, etc.
- A survey found that in the event of a child choking 53% of parents would try to get the object out using their fingers; however placing fingers into the throat could cause damage!
- Nearly 9 in 10 teenagers have been confronted with some kind of medical emergency, 4 out of 5 of them say that they would feel safer if they had some basic first aid knowledge to apply to the situation and its circumstances.
