Defibrillators in Public Areas

Debate between Maria Eagle and Tim Loughton

Monday 16th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Maria Eagle]

The hon. Gentleman has had a frightening experience in his family, and also learnt the incredible importance of not only having defibrillators available, but having people who know how to use them. I could hardly better his family’s example of how important that is.

A study by the British Heart Foundation found that for every single minute without defibrillation, chances of survival fall by between 7% and 10%. The Care Quality Commission sets a response target of eight minutes for emergency ambulance services, but we know that ambulances cannot possibly arrive within that time in every case. Even if they did, the chances of survival without immediate defibrillation and CPR will have already plummeted to 20% or lower. Access to a defibrillator can therefore make a huge difference. If cardiac arrest is recognised, basic first aid is given, 999 is called and CPR is applied, in combination with rapid and effective defibrillation, the chances of survival can exceed 50%. In fact, in some cases it can be as high as 80%. However, immediate action is vital. A defibrillator must be at hand for those survival rates to be realised.

Three people who know that better than most are my constituents Mark, Joanne and Ben King. In 2011, Mark and Joanne King lost their son Oliver, and Ben lost his brother. Oliver tragically died following a sudden cardiac arrest while racing in, and winning, a school swimming competition. He was just 12 years old. He had a hidden heart condition, and without access to a defibrillator at school his chances of survival on that day were dramatically reduced. Had he lived, this Saturday would have been his 18th birthday.

I never met Oliver, but I have been struck by talking to those who knew him well. He was clearly a very happy and popular boy, judging by the tributes that poured in from those who knew him following the shock of that terrible day. He was known as a big character at King David High School. His teachers recall his “uncompromising zest for life” and how he was loved and respected by boys and girls and teachers alike. His best friend David recalls Oliver’s charm and how it was deployed on more than one occasion to get them out of a tricky situation. This year is particularly difficult for David, as he will be celebrating the milestone of turning 18 without his best friend.

Everyone mentions Oliver’s love of football—he was a staunch Evertonian. His family and friends all recall his great talent and potential on the pitch. One of his teachers describes him as

“a sportsman at heart and a natural at whatever he turned his hand to”.

Above all, Oliver was caring, loving and incredibly close to his family:

“family was everything to Oliver.”

It goes without saying that Oliver’s death left many who knew and loved him with a great sense of loss. His family and friends are sadly not alone in going through this terrible ordeal. As well as the thousands of people who die every year following sudden cardiac arrest, there are thousands more who are now faced with the agonising reality of living without their loved one.

[Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con)]

I pay tribute to the hon. Lady for bringing this important subject to the House and for her good fortune in having, potentially, three and a half hours in which to debate it. She has given an emotional case of somebody for whom, for the sake of a relatively simple and inexpensive bit of kit, the outcome might have been different. Does she agree that public buildings—certainly places such as schools—should automatically be fitted with a defibrillator?

Will the hon. Lady pay tribute to Sompting Big Local in my constituency, which has a lottery grant for the enhancement of the village? Its first priority was to install four defibrillators in every corner of the village, including one outside the local pharmacy, because it saw it as a worthwhile thing to do. Many other people have imaginatively used things such as redundant telephone boxes by replacing them with defibrillators as an obvious help point for local people. Should not we just be doing those things automatically?

[Maria Eagle]

I agree very much with the hon. Gentleman. He has set out an example from his constituency. Around the country, there are many ways in which communities are starting to ensure that they have access to defibrillators so that, if needed, they are there. I welcome that. We should try to ensure that defibrillators are available throughout our land—up and down, north and south, and east and west. What happened to Oliver is not as rare as we might hope. In the UK, some 270 young people tragically die every year of sudden cardiac arrest while at school. That furthers the hon. Gentleman’s point that having defibrillators routinely available in schools seems to be a no-brainer.

In 2012, Oliver’s parents, Mark and Joanne, set up the Oliver King Foundation in memory of their son. It aims to raise awareness of the conditions that lead to sudden cardiac arrest, which is vital as the family did not know that Oliver had any condition that might have led to what happened. If they had known, probably with the diagnosis of a simple electrocardiogram test, they may well have been able to take steps that could have avoided what happened. Other aims of the foundation are to purchase and place defibrillators in schools and sports centres, to train staff how to use them and to hold screening events to enable simple, painless ECG testing to help diagnose such conditions and ensure that what happened to Oliver does not happen to the children of other families.

Mark and Joanne have done an incredible job. Their aim is simple: to ensure that no more families have to go through what they did, knowing that the death of a son, daughter, mother, father or friend may have been prevented. They campaign tirelessly and effectively to ensure that every school in the country is equipped with an automated external defibrillator. They have the support of more than 200 hon. and right hon. Members of this House, across parties.

Automated external defibrillators are specifically designed for use by non-medically trained people. They are remarkable, life-saving machines that are not difficult to use. The machine will apply an electrical pulse only when it detects an irregular heart rate and it talks the user through the process, step by step. However, at about £1,200, AEDs are not cheap and, even if provided, some people are often afraid of using them. As a result, many schools and high-risk public areas in the UK are still not equipped with them. As a direct result of the work of the Oliver King Foundation, more than 800 schools and public places now have this life-saving kit and people who are confident to use it. In Liverpool, Oliver’s home city, not a single school is now without one thanks to the work of the foundation and Liverpool City Council.

The foundation has also managed to train 15,000 people around the country in how to use an AED, thus making sure that in sudden difficult circumstances the confidence is there to use this life-saving kit. As a direct result, 11 lives have been saved that would otherwise have been lost, including an elderly gentleman who suffered a heart attack at his local gym. Thanks to the staff’s quick thinking and use of the gym’s defibrillator, he was sat up and talking by the time the emergency services arrived. In Woolton in my constituency, where Oliver used to live, an AED provided by the foundation was deployed three times this December alone. If the defibrillator is available and training is provided, people will use one: it is as simple as that.

However, we cannot and should not be reliant on charities to do all the heavy lifting and work in this policy area. In November, the hon. Member for Lewes (Maria Caulfield) introduced the Defibrillators (Availability) Bill under the 10-minute rule procedure, with the purpose being to

“increase the rates of survival rates from non-hospital cardiac arrests across the UK”.

Its objective is basically to do for the nation what the OK Foundation has done for Liverpool and is continuing to do in its work in other places: providing defibrillators in public places and training people to use them.