OUR front page story this week about staff of the Falls Leisure Centre saving the life of Gerard Bradley, who collapsed after his regular visit to the facility, is an inspirational story of human heroism.
Barry O’Hare and Sean O’Connor and the team at the leisure centre already have the thanks and endless appreciation of Gerard and his family after their CPR intervention brought the Ardoyne man back from the brink of death. And they have the thanks and endless admiration of us all, for who knows when we or our loved ones will require the help of someone skilled in the art of resuscitation and first aid?
But while trained responders like Barry and Sean and the rest of the staff are deserving of all the praise they are getting, they will be the first to stress that the best way we can pay them back is by ‘passing it on’, as the saying goes. The best response from those of us marvelling at and grateful for the expertise that saved Gerard’s life, is to become – if we are capable of it – proficient in first aid ourselves.
For while there are legions of professional and amateur first-aiders ready and willing to spring to the help of others as required, in the way that Barry and Sean did, the truth is that when the next person collapses in the street (and it happens every day), there is simply no guarantee that someone nearby will be able to do what is required to save their lives.
So why not do it today? Go online and find out the best route for you to become a first-aider and a life-saver. The gift of life is precious. Make it one you can give.
Wise up, Minister
GORMLESS Gordon is at it again.
Communities Minister Gordon Lyons has weighed in on a row over a storytelling session at a Belfast library hosted by two drag performers.
The Holywood Arches event has been popular with local parents and children for eight years, but this year has been fallen upon by the media on the very flimsy pretext of two anonymous people with an iPhone barracking the performers as they left the venue.
Put the voracious appetite of our radio, TV and newspapers for divisive and click-friendly non-stories to the side, because they are always going to do whatever it takes to attract sales, readers and views. The swift intervention of this government minister has once again underlined the uncanny ability of the DUP man to walk into lampposts.
On the same day the story hit the headlines, Mr Lyons opined that the event had no place in a library and said that he had instructed department officials to contact NI Libraries with a view to making it the last.
The centuries-old practice of costumed storytelling is of course being conflated here with the hot-button issue of Transgenderism and Mr Lyons will discover that the two are chalk and cheese should his hasty decision to lay down the law be tested in the courts.
Children flourish through reading. There's plenty of books about it. We suggest the Minister checks one out.
