More than 350 students a year will be learning CPR in District 69 thanks to a special teacher training day last week.
About a dozen School District 69 (Oceanside) high school teachers spent Thursday upgrading their CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation) skills and heart health education which they will take back to their schools to train Grade 10 students.
The teachers, from Ballenas, Kwalikum and PASS/Woodwinds, received the training through the ACT High School CPR Program, a partnership of the Advanced Coronary Treatment Foundation (ACT), BC Ambulance and the paramedic’s union (CUPE Local 873) with corporate and community partners.
Like all the trainers, BC Ambulance Regional Training Officer Teresa White volunteered her times.
Once the program is set up in all public Canadian secondary schools, approximately 50,000 youth will be trained in CPR each year.
ACT finds local partners who donate the mannequins, materials and teacher training needed to set up the program. The teachers then teach CPR to their students as a regular part of the curriculum, reaching all youth prior to graduation.
The program is being funded by AstraZeneca, Pfizer and sanofi-aventis which has enabled the district to buy 60 CPR mannequins and corresponding curriculum materials.
Cardiovascular disease accounts for more than a fifth of all deaths in B.C. and citizen CPR response can improve survival rate for victims by almost fourfold. It’s estimated that only 15 per cent of British Columbians know CPR.
To date ACT has set up the program in more than 1,500 schools across Canada, training more than 1.7 million youth.
For more on the foundation visit www.actfoundation.ca.