72 Police Officers now certified as first responders

Seventy-two Police Officers on Wednesday graduated from a Basic First Responder Training Course which is aimed at providing better care for injured persons.
The training which encompasses basic first response protocol, life support/ CPR and trauma were offered to the Guyana Police Force’s officers in order to reduce the number of preventable deaths at accidents, shooting and other combat situations.
At the end of the training, the officers were required to sit an examination; only the officers scoring more than 70 per cent were certified at Wednesday’s programme.
In explaining the concept of the training process, Head of the Emergency Medical Service, Dr Zulfikar Bux highlighted instances in which persons were injured and due to the lack of proper first response care by Police, the victims were permanently injured or died.
“Please look after the lives of yourselves, your colleagues, and more importantly john public, they are the ones we serve,” he urged the officers.
Also speaking at the event was Police Commissioner Seelall Persaud, who expressed the Force’s appreciation to Dr Bux for working so efficiently with the officers in order to complete the training.
The Commissioner, in identifying the main reason for the course stated that, “A lot of deaths resulting from gunshot injuries aren’t cases where vital organs were damaged, people die from shock and haemorrhage, they bleed to death.”
He went on to note that owing to this training course, this particular cause of death will be reduced. The Commissioner also touched on trauma kits which they have received through donation from The Association of Caribbean Commissioners of Police. He stated that these kits are aiding in the execution of the course.
The 72 certified officers will now be tasked with responding to emergency scenes and doing their utmost best to lessen the number of fatalities arising from those situations.