Leeds United is urging its amazing supporters to become CPR certified with the British Heart Foundation (BHF) in advance of our Sky Bet Championship matchup with Sunderland.
According to fan research conducted by Sky Bet, even though 44% of fans have personally encountered situations requiring CPR, half of them would not feel confident enough to administer it if necessary.
In addition to the matchday program and LED perimeter boards at the Stadium of Light, Leeds United and Sunderland players will support the campaign by warming up in specially created Every Minute Matters t-shirts, which will help spread awareness of the value of learning CPR.
It coincides with a significant milestone being celebrated by Sky Bet and the British Heart Foundation’s “Every Minute Matters” campaign. Since the partnership started in May, the campaign has assisted in motivating over 100,000 people to begin learning life-saving CPR through the BHF’s online tool RevivR.
The goal of the ground-breaking effort is to teach 270,000 people CPR, which is equal to three Wembley Stadiums, and to raise up to £3 million in donations for the charity.
In an effort to encourage as many people as possible to learn CPR, Luton Town captain and “Every Minute Matters” ambassador Tom Lockyer paid a visit to Thorp Arch in the days preceding the game with his Wales international teammate and club captain, Ethan Ampadu.
“CPR is a vital skill that helped save thousands of lives every year,” Lockyer stated. Although it’s incredible that we’ve hit 100,000, it’s obvious that we still need to close this confidence gap.
“We are eager to have Leeds and Sunderland support the campaign and show their supporters that learning CPR is straightforward and only takes 15 minutes using the BHF’s online RevivR tool. Leeds and Sunderland are two of the biggest and best supported clubs in the entire EFL.”
As you mentioned, you never know when you might need to perform CPR, so Ampadu continued, “I’m going to log on and I’m going to learn [CPR].”
A staggering £639,000 has been raised thus far, with £380,000 coming from the Sky Bet Play Offs in May and £259,000 since August coming from Sky Bet’s commitment to contribute £10,000 for each EFL goal scored in “stoppage time” and £1000 for each goal scored over the World Heart Day weekend.
The funds donated thus far by the campaign will be used by the British Heart Foundation to support the organization’s community resuscitation efforts, which include teaching more people how to perform defibrillation and CPR. This will entail sponsoring 80 extra community defibrillators across the UK.
The British Heart Foundation’s (BHF) chief executive, Dr. Charmaine Griffiths, stated: “Every Minute Matters is growing and Sky Bet’s kind support is truly making a difference at a time when the British Heart Foundation’s work is required more than ever. Through this arrangement, money will be raised that will genuinely save lives.
In addition to putting defibrillators in areas that most need them, working with Sky Bet will enable us to guarantee that spectators, families, and communities all around the nation may receive life-saving CPR and defibrillation training. People will have the highest chance of surviving an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest if we train our country to be lifesavers.
In the UK, there are about 30,000 cardiac arrests that occur outside of hospitals annually, or at least five every 90 minutes. One minute without CPR can cut one’s chances of survival by as much as 10%. Sadly, less than ten percent of survivors make it out alive, frequently due to the incompetence or fear of others around them when it comes to performing CPR.
“We set ourselves a really ambitious goal of encouraging 270,000 people to begin learning CPR by May 2025, and it’s amazing to reach the 100,000 mark,” stated Steve Birch, Chief Commercial Officer of Sky Bet. With Leeds and Sunderland’s help, maybe this weekend can bring the significance of acquiring these life-saving skills to a whole new level.
