CPR training programme being taken up as a major campaign: CM

The Health department’s popular campaign to promote the awareness of and training in Cardio Pulmonary Resuscitation (CPR), “Hridayapoorvam”, will be another model health initiative pioneered by Kerala, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan has said.

Inaugurating the campaign here on Monday, Mr. Vijayan said the CPR training programme was being taken up as a major campaign because with some training, everyone could potentially become life-savers in an emergency.

At least in the case of some people who went into cardiac arrest and sudden death, timely resuscitation would have saved them. Kerala launched this CPR training initiative so that none should die because of lack of proper first aid, he said.

It was quite concerning that cardiac ailments were on the rise in the State. While creating awareness about lifestyle interventions and disease prevention, it was important that the public was also given the first lessons in essential life-saving measures, he said.

The youth and the frontline workers should be equipped in recognising sudden cardiac arrest and providing CPR. Training programmes in CPR were being held at 200 centres across the State. The government intended to give CPR training to school students and government employees and people in rural areas in the next phase, he added.

Health Minister Veena George said many traumatic events wherein people just collapsed and died had been reported in recent times and that the Health department decided to take up this initiative after fully comprehending the importance of timely CPR in saving lives.

Ms. George said, if earlier, the mortality rate of people reaching hospitals with cardiac arrest was 30%, this had been brought down to less than 6%. By imparting CPR skills to the general public, more lives could be saved.

Speaker A.N. Shamseer presided. Ministers, MLAs, Health and Legislative Assembly officials, and IMA and KGMOA leaders, among others, participated in the inaugural function.