A silent emergency that occurs where it is least expected

Every year, between 40,000 and 50,000 people in Argentina they suffer a out-of-hospital cardiac arrest. Most of these episodes occur in everyday places: home, street, work or school, far from specialized medical personnel or emergency equipment. The statistics They are forceful: without maneuvers of Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (CPR)less than 10% of these people survive, while with immediate intervention the chances are Cudrupricreaching between the 40% y 50% .

At a global level, the World Health Organization estimates that more than 3.5 million people They suffer these types of episodes annually, which positions cardiac arrest as one of the main causes of death worldwide. In Argentina, the magnitude of the problem is equivalent to one person suffering cardiac arrest every 10 minutes outside a hospital.

Time as a critical factor: every minute counts

The effectiveness of resuscitation depends directly on the response speed. According to data from international registries in the United States and Europe, each minute that passes without CPR reduces the chances of survival among a 7% and 10% .

“Even with optimal response timewithout any delay or external interference, if the ambulance arrived in 5 or 10 minutes, which is a record time, these are minutes without oxygen in which life is at extremely high risk,» they explain from Emergenciesthe emergency services company that empowers the community through Emergency Foundation . The first link of the survival chain It is, therefore, the citizen action before the arrival of the professionals.

The concrete impact of community training

International experience demonstrates the transformative impact of mass CPR education. In Norwaywhere resuscitation teaching is mandatory in schoolsthe survival rate for out-of-hospital cardiac arrests doubled in less than a decade .

In Japanthe implementation of community training programs along with the massive installation of Automatic External Defibrillators (AED) in public spaces allowed a similar jump in recovery rates. These cases confirm that the collective consciousness and the preparation They are public health tools as crucial as any medical advance.

The Argentine legal framework and the outstanding debt

In Argentina, the Ley 27.159 – sanctioned in 2016 – establishes the obligation that all public and private spaces with public access have at least one DEA and with trained staff in its use and in CPR techniques. However, the application of the rule is still uneven throughout the territory.

The law seeks to create a network of “cardioprotected spaces” that allows an immediate response to a cardiac event. The combination of Immediate CPR and the use of a DEA – devices designed to be used by anyone, as they guide the user through voice instructions – is the intervention that has the greatest impact on survival.

Raising awareness and training the population is not only a medical recommendation, but also a public health strategy that could save thousands of lives a year, transforming ordinary citizens into the first linkand the most crucial, the chain of survival.