Children in England to be taught First Aid and CPR

Did you know that last week Education Secretary, Damian Hinds, confirmed that CPR will be added to the school curriculum in England? 

The new proposals will see first aid and CPR being added to the curriculum as part of the Department for Education’s (DfE) plan to strengthen teaching of health, sex and relationships education in England from 2020.

With out of hospital cardiac arrest survival rates being up to three times higher in countries where first aid is taught in schools compared to the UK, this decisive move could see thousands of lives saved each year.

The change follows years of tireless campaigning to get first aid and CPR onto the curriculum. A key player in which has been Qualsafe’s Medical Director and Vice-President to the Resuscitation Council (UK), Dr. Andrew Lockey, as well as other organisations including the British Heart Foundation, St John Ambulance and the British Red Cross.

Here at Qualsafe, we are overjoyed to see that all young people in England will have been taught basic first aid and CPR, including the use of defibrillators by the time they leave secondary school. Paramedic and leading author of the UK’s No.1 range of first aid training books, Nigel Barraclough, had the following to say:

“It is great to see that this landmark decision is now becoming a reality and thousands of secondary school pupils across the country will be trained in valuable life-saving CPR and first aid. Norway has been teaching CPR in schools for many years and the increase in bystander CPR is the main reason that they have survival rates as high as 25% compared to the UK’s 10%. By providing school children with the opportunity to learn these valuable skills, this is a significant step towards improving cardiac survival rates in the UK.”