5 Safety

• Fire and carbon monoxide at home7 lessons
• CPR, the AED and choking6 lessons

5. Learn what to do in the first minutes of an emergency, because you will often be there before help is.

More than 350,000 cardiac arrests happen outside hospitals in the US each year, and about 90% of those people do not survive. A person who is bleeding heavily can die within five minutes, and once a smoke alarm sounds you may have as little as one or two minutes to escape. Read the steps here, then practise them in a certified class.

1. 5.1Call 911 in the US or Canada and give your exact location first. For a drooping face, arm weakness or slurred speech, call at once and note the time the signs started.
   5.1 Call 911 and give your location5.13 Spot a stroke and call 911
2. 5.2If a teen or adult suddenly collapses and is not breathing normally, call 911 and push hard and fast in the center of the chest, 100 to 120 times a minute. If an adult cannot cough, speak or breathe, give back blows and abdominal thrusts.
   5.14 Hands-only CPR5.15 Help a choking adult
3. 5.3Press hard and keep pressing on heavy bleeding, and cool a burn under cool running water for 20 minutes, never with ice or butter.
   5.11 Stop heavy bleeding5.6 Cool a burn with running water
4. 5.4Roll an unresponsive person who is breathing normally onto their side. If you suspect an opioid overdose and they will not wake or are breathing slowly or not at all, call 911 and give naloxone.
   5.12 The recovery position5.16 Respond to an opioid overdose with naloxone
5. 5.5Test every smoke alarm once a month, know two ways out of every room and practise them, and smother a pan fire with a lid and turn off the heat, never water.
   5.5 Test a smoke alarm and change its battery5.2 Plan two ways out in a fire5.9 Put out a pan fire with a lid
6. 5.6Learn to save yourself in deep water: jump in over your head, float or tread water for a minute, then swim 25 yards (about 23 m) and get out. Test it in a pool with a lifeguard before you rely on it.
   5.4 The five water survival skills
7. 5.7Know your safety equipment before you need it: alarms, extinguishers, AEDs and car seats.
   5.8Safety5.8 Carbon monoxide detector beeping: what it means and what to do5.10 How is a fire extinguisher used? The PASS method5.7 AED pad placement: how to use an AED5.17 When can an infant car seat face forward
8. 5.8Treat a weather watch as the signal to get ready and a warning as the signal to move: for a tornado, go at once to the lowest floor of a sturdy building, into a small interior room away from windows, and cover your head and neck.
   5.3 Sheltering from a tornado: watch vs. warning