The fall-out from a key report arising from the public inquiry into the Manchester Arena bombing could revolutionise how life-saving first aid is taught in schools and within businesses. All primary and secondary school pupils are currently taught first aid, including those over 12 being trained in CPR, as part of the National Curriculum.
But the chairman of the inquiry, Sir John Saunders, has now called for the Department for Education to consider extending the curriculum requirement on first aid to teach pupils how to deal with catastrophic bleeds or blocked airways - so-called 'first responder interventions'. His comments came in a lengthy - and often damming - report published last week on the response of the emergency services to the 2017 atrocity, which claimed 22 lives when a suicide bomber detonated a device after an Ariana Grande concert.
Sir John found one of the 22 victims who died following the explosion - 28-year-old John Atkinson - could have been saved if not for the 'inadequate' response of police, paramedics and fire crews. There was also a 'remote possibility' the youngest victim, eight-year-old Saffie-Rose Roussos, could have survived as well, the report also concluded.
