What does first aid means to Chinese communities

I attended a first-aid training for babies and children recently provided by Red Cross Australia. It exceeded my expectation.

Equipping with basic first aid knowledge and skills ensures a faster and safer recovery before an ambulance arrives. Basic life support, CPR, first aid skills to situations like bleeding, choking, asthma, drowning, febrile convulsion and so on are all new to me.

Surprisingly, I am not alone with less first-aid knowledge after chatting with my Chinese friends both in Australia and China. Fewer than one percent of people in China are trained in first aid (source: China government official website  www.gov.cn). It is risky given such a huge population base.

One of the underlying reasons based on the conversations I had is that first aid is perceived to be the responsibility of some certain people, for example nurses, doctors, ambulance staffs etc.

More importantly, there are liability concerns in providing first-aid assistance for ordinary people to respond to emergent situations.

A controversial case “the death of Wang Yue” happened in 2011 when the toddler was run over by two vehicles. The entire incident was caught on a video, which shows eighteen people seeing the child but refusing to help. A survey afterwards shows that a majority 71 percent thought that the people who passed the child without helping were afraid of getting into trouble themselves. Thankfully, China’s national Good Samaritan law came into force in 2017 which would protect common people to provide first-aid support from legal liability, regardless of the outcome.

It surely needs time to change the perception and remove the liability concerns though, education for the communities or individuals (both adults and kids) could be an option to improve current situation.

Interestingly after some preliminary researches, I found many first-aid kits manufactures instead of first-aid providers in China that offer professional training to this segment. Major providers include Red Cross, local hospitals, and some non-for-profit organizations.

Personally, I have been working closely with our Australian partners in the China safety industry for years. Given the situation provided, I feel the urgency.  

Next week I will be travelling and meeting with some partners and clients in China. I would like to propose this as a topic to understand their views and explore further to see if we could contribute to this area with the support of Australian practitioners.

If you have any creative ideas by providing this far-reaching services to the Chinese community (such as dumb ways to die campaign😊) , please feel free to shoot me an email at [email protected].