Shenzhen Emergency Office will train 120 first responders in three sessions this year.
A first responder is a person with specialized training in what to do when they are the first to arrive and provide assistance at the scene of an emergency, such as an accident or a natural disaster. A certified first responder can provide pre-hospital care in a certain jurisdiction, such as packaging and transporting patients by nonmotorized means during medical emergencies.
During the first session, which started Monday, the trainees are learning skills for handling emergencies, such as disaster prevention, evacuation, medical aid, post-disaster psychological counseling and firefighting.
Trainees will also go to communities, parks and public squares to promote the First Responder Program among the public and raise public awareness and capabilities for handling emergencies.
The program was listed as one of the key projects for improving the wellbeings of residents in 2017. Shenzhen Emergency Office trained 98 certified first responders that year.
According to the plan, the office will set up a First Responder Network covering key industries and communities with 30,000 certified first responders by the end of 2020.
Research data showed first responders can greatly improve the survival rate of victims in any kind of emergency.
On Feb. 17, 2014, 35-year-old Liang Ya, a manager with IBM in Shenzhen, collapsed on the stairs of Exit C at Shuiwan Station on Metro Line 2. Employees of Shenzhen Metro Co. arrived at the scene within four minutes, but only made an emergency call after 15 minutes. During that period, the employees failed to take any action. Liang was pronounced dead when medical employees arrived on the scene.
Shenzhen Metro Co. was ordered by a court to give Liang’s family 300,000 yuan (US$43,860) as compensation for failing to take effective action. The company was partially blamed for the delay in calling the medical emergency center or police.