The City of London Police will provide 320 kits – which enable a bystander to control life-threatening haemorrhaging from a stab wound – to venues with late-night licences.
It has been organised in partnership with The Daniel Baird Foundation, which was founded after a pubgoer was stabbed and died on a night out with friends.
Daniel Baird bled to death shortly after he arrived at a hospital in Birmingham with a stab wound yet his family said he might have survived if there had been first aid or a bleed control kit available earlier.
The foundation is run by Lynne Baird, Daniel’s mother, and it has already organised a similar bleed control kit initiative in the West Midlands.
Life-saving scheme
Lynne runs the foundation in memory of her son, who was fatally stabbed while out with friends in Birmingham on 8 July 2017.
London recorded the highest rate of 169 offences involving a knife per 100,000 population in 2018-19, a rise from the year before.
Police said the kits could help save lives because the average ambulance response time to a 999 call was seven minutes whereas bleeding from a serious stab wound could prove fatal in three to five minutes.
City of London Police’s assistant commissioner Alistair Sutherland said the kits would help the force achieve its aim of making the district as safe as possible for residents, workers and visitors.
He said: “The City of London Police is proud to launch this initiative, in partnership with The Daniel Baird Foundation, as part of Lynne’s passionate campaign in memory of her son.
“Daniel’s death was a tragedy that no parent should ever have to suffer. The initiative we’re launching with Lynne’s foundation today will help Daniel’s memory go on in the lives that will be saved.”
National aspirations
Lynne Baird said she hoped police across the country would be motivated to do something similar.
She said: “I’m delighted that the City of London Police has agreed to partner with The Daniel Baird Foundation, and that these life-saving kits will now be distributed to venues across the City.
“I’m very proud of what the foundation has achieved so far, initially in West Midlands and now with the City of London Police, but I don’t want it to stop here.
"I hope that this launch today will spark more forces to join our campaign and help make these kits available up and down the country.”
Kits will be distributed across pubs in the Square Mile area over the next few weeks, funded by the police.
Pub staff will also be trained by Prometheus Medical, which developed and produced the bleed control packs.
