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I have a question

By Chris Jefferies
August 10, 2009 at 2:13 pm

What did you do today?

Felt the Monday blues? Enjoyed the sunshine? Had a day off?

A normal day.

Not for everyone. Every day, on average seven people die on our roads. Each year, 28,500 people are seriously injured and many of these casualties are children. roadsafetycrash

The British Red Cross is currently running a campaign called “Help a Mate”. The idea is for peer educators to teach young people in deprived areas how to deal with road traffic collisions. Next week, a team of peer educators (including me!) will be touring the south east visiting various youth and community groups.

The session we run is really interactive and was designed by young people. First of all we discuss with the group about what dangers could be at a road traffic accident, things such as glass, petrol and other vehicles. Then we go through some basic first aid skills such as the recovery position, Cardio-pulmonary resuscitation and spinal injuries.

Then comes the exciting part. We stage a mock traffic accident using make-up to create various fake injuries. They always end up looking rather realistic! The young people get to have a go (under supervision of course…) at dealing with the incident. This gives them a chance to practice the skills they’ve just learnt and its good fun!peered

The feedback we get is very positive, and the young people end up feeling more confident that they could stop and help at a road traffic accident. This is really important as up to 85 per cent of pre-hospital deaths from road traffic accidents could be prevented by basic first aid.

What did you do today?

I learnt how to save a life.

Comments (5) »

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This entry was posted on Monday, August 10th, 2009 at 2:13 pm and is filed under First aid. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

  • http://www.redcross.org.uk/ Brad Smith

    Hey Chris,

    Sounds like you have fun at these sessions too! This appears to be a very realistic way to practice first aid skills. Wish I could come and take part..

  • http://www.redcross.org.uk Brad Smith

    Hey Chris,

    Sounds like you have fun at these sessions too! This appears to be a very realistic way to practice first aid skills. Wish I could come and take part..

  • Pingback: Blog: Tales from the road (day one) | Spend and Give

  • Charlotte Jameson

    I know that this is completly irellevent, but how much does it cost to run the red cross ?

  • webteamredcross

    Hi Charlotte. Good question! This page gives a breakdown of income and expenditure in 2009 for the British Red Cross: http://www.redcross.org.uk/standard.asp?id=82431

Author

Chris Jefferies

Chris Jefferies

Chris is a young volunteer in Surrey. He teaches first aid and does first aid at events.

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