We're Getting Noticed....

Thanks to the tremendous support from you, this petition has now reached the ears of the BBC Current Affairs team, who contacted me on Monday. Several Heart Charities have also posted the link to the petition on Twitter, including the Arrhythmia Alliance and local groups such as DefibsSaveLives, PlayGolf4Defibs and North East Hearts with Goals, Defibs4Bolton and Defibs4Bury amongst others, all of whom do fabulous work to make our communities safer places by raising awareness of the dangers of Cardiac Arrest, the importance of CPR and the prompt use of AEDs. They also raise funds to buy AEDs for local Sports Clubs, Community Groups and Schools. Well worth finding out who is active in your area and lending them a hand, or starting one up. If they can all do it, so can big corporations such as Ryanair.... I still await a reply from the Department of Transport to the questions in my last post. In the meantime I have read several excellent articles that add statistical weight to what we are trying to achieve - persuading Ryanair and others to change their policy and equip all their aircraft with an AED and train at least one crew member in CPR. One article described American Airlines' history of using AEDs. The undated article (certainly 10 years old) published by a US online Emergency Services magazine states that American Airlines had saved 50 lives using AEDs on board aircraft within the first seven years of carrying them (1997). The article also suggests the survival rate for deployment of the AEDs was 56% at that point (89 AED incidents). A Corporate Medical Department staff member, Linda A Campbell is quoted as saying "One reason for our success is that the Defibrillator is just yards away from the passenger and American's flight attendants are trained to use it" - telling words indeed. According to the article, the USA's FAA (Federal Airlines Authority) made AEDs compulsory on all passenger aircraft over a certain size in 2004. I wonder why European citizens aren't valued as highly? As this is precisely the type of information required to drive home the case for all commercial aircraft to carry AEDs, I have written to American Airlines to ask them to corroborate the figures and to provide current data that can then be presented to Ryanair and the Department of Transport to help them make the correct decision. Keep up the great work everyone and please, keep sharing and posting on social media... it's working!