Automated External Defibrillators: Public Access

Aaron Bell Excerpts

Thursday 18th November 2021 Westminster Hall

[Aaron Bell (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone, and a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East (Stuart C. McDonald). I congratulate the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) on securing this important debate and on his private Member’s Bill. It may be the case that we do not have time for it on the day it is scheduled for, but I hope the Government will look carefully at the Bill.

The debate is well timed for me, because I am due to visit a school in my constituency tomorrow that installed a defibrillator only last Friday. However, I am afraid the background to that installation is tragic. Ravensmead Primary School in Bignall End in my Newcastle-under-Lyme constituency has had a very sad loss in recent weeks. A teaching assistant suffered a heart attack at school and later passed away. Sam Benson was a much-loved member of the Ravensmead community, a mum of three children, and a teaching assistant who had been involved with the school for 20 years, initially as a volunteer to help children with reading and later as a member of staff. In the words of her headteacher, Melanie Goodall,

“Sam was a fabulous teaching assistant. She was fun and loved life. She was always bright and colourful. She used to work in the school office and was the first face that many parents saw here. She would have Michael Buble on a loop in the office.”

The circumstances of Sam’s death are not only tragic, but illustrate the problems with access to defibrillators. When she collapsed one morning in September, several colleagues raced a hundred yards up the road to a local pub, which thankfully did have a defibrillator, while several other colleagues commenced CPR immediately. However, it took them several minutes to get hold of the equipment as they needed to phone for the access code. Fellow teaching assistant, Heather Evans, was one of the members of staff trying to access the defibrillator at The Swan pub after Sam’s collapse. She told our local paper, the Stoke Sentinel, that,

“Running up the road, it was like running up Everest”.

By the time they got back to the school, the paramedics were already there. Sam was taken to hospital, and sadly died five days later.

I am enormously pleased to hear how quickly the paramedics were able to attend the scene, which is commendable given the pressure that the ambulance service is experiencing. However, as has been raised already, it is widely known that every minute counts when responding to cardiac arrests. The chance of successful defibrillation decreases by 23% for each minute that passes, according to a 2003 study. Therefore, if a defibrillator had been more readily available and used a couple of minutes sooner, who knows what difference it might have made? We will never know, but Sam’s chance of survival may have been higher. She was lucky that CPR was started almost immediately, which would have given her a much better chance than those who collapse alone.

In Sam’s honour, her husband Neville Benson, friends and members of the school community have been raising money for a defibrillator at the school and have raised over £4,000 in Sam’s memory. Tesco Express in Audley has actually donated a device, which has been installed, so that money will be used to help other schools in the area have access to the same device. Neville has also been in touch with me to talk about his desire that these devices be made mandatory in all schools—indeed, I spoke to him this morning. I know that new and refurbished state schools are required to have defibrillators. I saw the answer from my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Vicky Ford) to a written question on 10 September that the Government are looking at what more they can do, and she referred to what the previous Secretary of State for Education has done on the issue.

When Neville spoke to me this morning, he also made the sensible point that while it should not be a cost-benefit analysis, there is a financial benefit as well as the health benefit because quicker defibrillation reduces the chances of long-term disability, which could save society an awful lot of money for a relatively low cost in the short term. I would like to briefly mention the amazing work of the charity Cardiac Risk in the Young, which aims to provide heart screening for a minimum of 200 young people per year. I was introduced to the charity by David Hughes, my constituent in the same parish, who raises money for the charity in honour of his son, Daniel Hughes, who died suddenly at the age of 28 in 2015. In memory of Daniel, Dave has been working to raise awareness and reduce the frequency of young sudden cardiac death. He said:

“We will never know if heart screening would have saved our precious son’s life but we never want another family to go through what we went through. There are no words to describe the emptiness and heartache we feel everyday; all we can do is work hard to ensure that Dan’s legacy lives on for years to come and that he continues to make a difference to people’s lives now as he did when he was with us.”

Dave has raised hundreds of thousands of pounds since Dan’s death. I have been out to support him on some of those things. If the Minister could take this message back to the Department, I know Dave would be very grateful.

Defibrillators can mean the difference between life and death, as we know only too well. Of the 30,000 out-of- hospital cardiac arrests across the United Kingdom each year, the overall survival rate is a shocking one in 10. It is estimated that publicly accessible defibrillators are used in fewer than 5% of those incidents. That is a very sad statistic, but a sadder one still is that, according to research conducted by the Resuscitation Council, less than half of bystanders in the UK would intervene when they witness someone collapse. That statistic is substantially lower than figures for other regions and countries that have comparable demographics. The willingness rate is 73% in Norway, 66% in Seattle and 60% in north Holland, and their survival rates are over 20%, so that is something we also need to tackle. Norway has been teaching CPR in schools for many years, and that bystander CPR has got its survival rates as high as 25%, compared with less than 10% in the UK. I am very pleased to see that, from September 2020, we did add CPR to the national curriculum in secondary schools.

Finally—this is another point that people have raised—most of us will remember the Euro 2020 footage this year, when Danish footballer Christian Eriksen collapsed. Of course, his chances of survival were greatly increased from the start because of the urgent medical assistance that arrived immediately. CPR and a defibrillator were applied during those crucial first few minutes. Those scenes were deeply distressing to witness for everyone watching in the stadium or from home, but thankfully he had a good outcome. He is now doing so well that he is working towards returning to playing football. We should be giving that same best chance of survival to everyone.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jim Shannon]

First, I thank all hon. Members who have spoken for their contributions. A consistent theme is coming through about having all the data in place; and The Circuit network is going a long way towards that.

I am very keen to be aware of the Welsh perspective and what is happening in Wales. There might be lessons there for us all to learn about how to do what is needed. I thank the hon. Member for Delyn (Rob Roberts) for giving us that perspective.

The hon. Member for Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East (Stuart C. McDonald) referred to access to AEDs and training. Again, that is a central theme that consistently comes up, with each and every person. He gave the example of Denmark. He also referred to the fact that in some cases AEDs can be delivered to rural areas by drone. I am not quite sure about the science of how that is done, but the point is that it is happening somewhere, and if it is happening somewhere and is successful, it might be the way to address this issue in some rural areas.

I was so sorry to hear about the lady whose case was raised by the hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Aaron Bell). The necessary timescale very clearly was not there. As a result, there will now be an AED in place. It was not there when the lady needed it, and all of us, including the Minister, have said that we wish to convey our sincere sympathies to the family.

[Aaron Bell]

May I thank the hon. Member and all other hon. Members who have expressed their sympathy? When I see Mr Benson, I will ensure that they are passed on to him, and when I speak to the headteacher tomorrow, I will ensure that they are passed on to the school as well.

[Jim Shannon]

There is a united consensus of sympathy in relation to that case.

I thank the hon. Member for Sedgefield (Paul Howell) for his support for this cause. He gave us a salient reminder of the 300 children who die each year from cardiac arrest. Sometimes, when we hear the figure of 30,000 for out-of-hospital cardiac arrests, we do not focus on all the people that includes.

I think we are all really interested in what the hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness (Graham Stuart) has done in his constituency. We would be very keen to find out more about how that has happened, because there is obviously something that we could learn from there.

I am very impressed by the fact that the hon. Member for Gordon (Richard Thomson) is so learned in this sector. I know him as a friend, so I am not surprised at his knowledge on this subject matter. I know that he is also a very athletic person. He gave the example of the sixth-form student who is alive today and pursuing a career because of an AED that was in the right place, at the right time. The hon. Gentleman and I feature in many debates together; indeed, I cannot think of any debate on a health issue that we have missed. I thank him. I am certainly keen to look at that, and will discuss how to bring it forward in a positive way with the Minister and the hon. Member for Sedgefield, if that is possible.

I want to sincerely thank the Minister. She referred to the fact that some 12 young people die from cardiac arrest every week. It is shocking that we can lose so much young life—people who could have done so much and had their futures ahead of them. The hon. Lady will know of young Oliver King. He comes to my mind on many occasions. I never knew the young boy, but I knew his daddy—that is very real.

The Minister referred to discussions with stakeholders, the NHS and first responders, who do excellent work in my constituency. She also referred to teaching and training in schools. That is all part of the joint approach that we need, alongside St John Ambulance and CPR training. The Minister also referred to Bills that will require an AED to be in place in all those buildings and that AEDs will be mandated in any new build. I am very grateful for that positive response from the Minister.

However, my private Member’s Bill aims to do one thing, if I can achieve it: it would mandate that all buildings, not just new buildings, must have AEDs. I know that the Minister agrees with that. We need a consensus across all Departments that have responsibility in this area. AEDs are available in lots of buildings already—in schools, Government buildings, many leisure centres, football clubs and so on. However, the Bill aims to achieve one thing: that AEDs are mandated in all buildings, and that those who are responsible for them will know that. The signage, training and all of the other things to which the Minister and others have referred are great points and are very important, but they illustrate that the Bill is so important. I hope that on Second Reading, on 10 December, the Government will see that the Bill is a win-win; there is no cost, but everyone gains. Those nine out of 10 victims of sudden cardiac arrest who are lost every year can be saved. The Bill is a lifesaver. I encourage the Government and all those involved to support it.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered public access to Automatic External Defibrillators.