FEMA Empowers the Public to Provide Lifesaving Care in an Emergency

More than 20,000 people trained to provide lifesaving care before professional help arrives on the scene.

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Jun 27, 2017, 10:00 ET

WASHINGTON, June 27, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) program You Are the Help Until Help Arrives is designed to educate and empower the public to take action in emergency situations and provide lifesaving care before professional help arrives.

Experience the interactive Multichannel News Release here: https://www.multivu.com/players/English/8025653-fema-you-are-the-help-until-arrives/

Since the program launched in February 2017, more than 20,000 people have been trained. Feedback has been positive. Eighty-five percent of training participants surveyed either agreed or strongly agreed the course taught them valuable concepts. And 97 percent of training participants surveyed indicated they are more likely to help after taking the course. Note: the respondents indicating they were not more likely to help qualified their response by indicating they were emergency professionals or were already highly likely to help.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, people hesitate to act when they feel they do not know what to do or are afraid they may make the situation worse. However, the actions most likely to save lives are simple and require no special skills or equipment.

People nearest to someone with life-threatening injuries are in the best position to provide first care. You Are the Help Until Help Arrives encourages the public to take these five actions when there is an emergency:

Call 9-1-1;
Protect the injured from harm;
Stop bleeding;
Position the injured so they can breathe; and
Provide comfort.

FEMA has developed free tools for the public to learn more, including materials for individuals who want to qualify as instructors to train others.

You Are the Help Until Help Arrives is a result of interagency collaboration spearheaded by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response and its the Medical Reserve Corps, the Uniformed Services University's National Center for Disaster Medicine and Public Health, and FEMA's Individual and Community Preparedness Division.

To download the free resources and to find out more about You Are the Help Until Help Arrives, visit www.ready.gov/untilhelparrives.

FEMA's mission is to support our citizens and first responders to ensure that as a nation we work together to build, sustain and improve our capability to prepare for, protect against, respond to, recover from and mitigate all hazards.

Follow FEMA online at www.fema.gov/blog, www.twitter.com/fema, www.facebook.com/fema and www.youtube.com/fema.

The social media links provided are for reference only. FEMA does not endorse any non-government websites, companies or applications.

SOURCE FEMA