Dear friend, dear friend,
On January 1, 2023, the British government decided to distribute defibrillators for children to public schools. (1.2)
At the beginning of January, the authorities ordered more than 20,000 to supply the 18,000 schools in the country.
On January 20, 2023, the government announced that they had been delivered. It happened very quickly.
The machines should be installed in all schools by the end of 2023, starting with schools that request them.
What has stung political and health officials across the Channel?
Save lives in danger
These machines are presented as “life-saving” defibrillators.
According to the authorities, this is the most ambitious program ever envisaged to equip all schools in the United Kingdom with defibrillators. (1.2)
The Ministry of Education, at the initiative of this program, considers that this new school health policy will allow both:
- to save lives at school;
- to promote the emergence of a generation of citizens capable of using defibrillators and who, thus, throughout their lives, will be able to save lives.
It is surprising to see that this new action is presented as urgent.
Why would children absolutely need defibrillators in the coming weeks?
Le cas Oliver King
In 2012, during a school swim race, a 12-year-old child died of cardiac arrest.
Help had arrived too late to save him.
His name was Oliver King.
The Ministry of Education website, which enthusiastically presents the government’s new programme, explains that this child would have been saved if there had been a defibrillator in the school and people trained in the use of this machine. (1)
For the department, the scientific data is very clear. Defibrillation would increase by 40% the chances of survival of people on the verge of cardiac arrest if it is intervened within 3 to 5 minutes with a defibrillator.
And the ministry insists: equipped with defibrillators, schools will be able to save the lives of children, teachers, parents of children and even passing visitors!
12 years of campaigning for the Oliver King Foundation
The boy’s father and mother, Mark and Joanne King, set up a foundation in their son’s name. For years, they have campaigned for the installation of defibrillators in schools.
For Mark King, the sudden acceleration of the government on the subject will be welcomed by students, parents and teachers. He considers it a day to mark with a white stone.
He explained to the press his pride in the fact that for more than 10 years, he has made this request a priority for schools.
This is a major victory for the Oliver King Foundation. This fight was fought for his son and will prevent other families from having to suffer the ordeal that his family has experienced.
In order to help schools and students to use the defibrillator, the school authorities have linked up with medical associations in the field. (1.2)
A first equipped school
The first school to receive its materials is the Garden Junior School in the northern suburbs of London. (1.2)
The English press explains that this happened at the very moment when 6 pupils were learning how the heart and blood circulation work. (1.2)
One of the students even asked what happens when the heart stops, which gave the teacher a unique opportunity to talk about the then new defibrillator.
Young people ! Isn’t life beautiful? We take care of you ! Know it.
Of course, this event in the school allowed the director, Mrs. Eileen Bhavsar, to take the floor and say how important it is for everyone to learn how to use this new material in order to be able to save lives. .
She explained that this learning would be incorporated into the children’s science class, which she hopes could help save lives in the future.
What is a defibrillator used for?
When doctors talk about cardiac arrest, it does not necessarily mean a permanent stoppage of the heart. (3)
In many cases, the heart continues to beat.
However, the rhythm of the heartbeats is so low that the heart’s contractions no longer allow blood to be pumped.
This phenomenon is called fibrillation.
As its name suggests, the purpose of the defibrillator is to put an end to this situation by restarting cardiac activity.
The machine analyzes the patient’s heart rhythm and administers an electric shock if necessary.
In these situations, time is of the essence. We have to act very quickly. Every minute counts.
From this point of view, the position of the parents of the young Oliver King is obviously understandable.
An increased risk in children
Equipping schools with defibrillators is therefore not useless. And prevention is often a good thing.
What raises questions in this case is both when this decision is made et the communication that goes with.
Because the tragedy that affected Oliver King is extremely rare.
Normally constituted children do not have cardiac arrest.
According to Dr. Suneel Dhand, internist, the number of defibrillators planned by the government is very impressive. (4.5)
He believes that no one, in his childhood, would have imagined that a student could have died of cardiac arrest. (4.5)
He adds that no one would have imagined being trained to have to put a defibrillator on a child. It would have seemed like an over-precaution.
The doctor wonders about the sudden need to equip so many schools.
He also wonders if the number of heart problems among under-18s has increased recently.
Unfortunately, there are no statistics on this. (4.5)
Is this the effect of the health crisis and the vaccination against covid 19?
Why did the British authorities wait 12 years before launching their program?
Why did they launch it so suddenly and so widely?
Why do they seem so worried to see so many children suffering from cardiac arrest in the months and years to come when, among those under 18, this problem is extremely rare?
One thing is certain, in France, the increase in heart problems among those under 18 is official. (6)
These are mainly myocarditis and pericarditis.
The ANSM, the national drug safety agency, says there is a link between the increase in these heart problems and the anti-covid 19 vaccine. (6)
The agency affirms, moreover, that these side effects are not frequent and that the evolution in young people is favorable.
For three years, students have been subjected to a narrative of fear, confined, deprived of school, subjected to more domestic violence.
They have seen their screen time increase and have been systematically vaccinated against a disease for which they are not at risk.
Today in the UK they are treated like old people. They are assured of the defibrillator and the personnel trained with it.
We cultivate fear by insisting that they will be able to “save lives.”
This approach says something about the fears of the British administration.
It confirms that we have entered a new era of thought.
Life, even in youth, seems impossible to us if it is not supported by a machine or other human creations.
We launch health policies and treatments that disrupt the health of young people, and then we try to protect it with other tricks.
This system is useful for many economic actors but it has nothing to do with life.
Life doesn’t need all that.
Before the age of 18 and even before the age of 30, almost no one needs a defibrillator.
Children need to run, to go to the forest, to play, to learn and to feed themselves with healthy and organic food.
They need to be loved, to be encouraged, to be listened to and to be pushed.
In France, the question of defibrillators in schools does not yet arise.
At the same time, in these days of strikes, the children are almost as often at home as at school.
Maybe we will be offered home defibrillators? To put next to the Linky counter?
The future will tell !
Naturally yours,
Augustine of Livois