To the Editor:

Thank you and Rob Oatley for the article on the Stop the Bleed kits. I would like to give you and your readers a little background on why I donated kits to two Warwick schools. 

A link appeared on my Facebook page in early 2018: www.dhs.gov/stopthebleed. I read it, especially the line, "Be the help until the help arrives," and put it aside. I thought it was a very good idea but it did not really apply to me.

Then Parkland happened, Valentine's Day, 2018.  Then William Parsons, age 15, September 5, 2018, shot and killed outside the Providence Area Career and Technical Academy, waiting for his Dad to pick him up from his first day as a high school student. Then Walmart, El Paso, Texas August 3, 2019, Dayton, Ohio, August 4, 2019, and Odessa Texas, August 31, 2019.

“Be the help until the help arrives" stayed in my mind as I learned that victims of these shootings died waiting for help. A person can bleed out in five minutes from a serious wound. 

Schools, shopping centers, highways – all places victims were in need of help. Everyday places in our lives. 

I wondered what I could do as a private citizen to be the help until the help arrives. I decided to donate four kits to two schools and ask others to do the same. Anyone can purchase a Stop the Bleed kit and donate it to his or her particular school, carry it in the car, and /or take a training course. These kits are available on Amazon.

And, of course, the kits have a place wherever help is needed, from an everyday industrial accident to a car accident. Just a few weeks ago, an elderly person mistakenly drove his car into five people at a popular eating establishment. Perhaps a kit in the restaurant would have been the help until the help arrived. 

I am asking alumni of Warwick schools, parents and grandparents of school-age children and businesses to consider donating some of these tax-deductible kits. Kits are not provided, as of yet, by cities or states. If you wish to donate a kit to a school, please check with the school in advance to determine if they are accepting kit donations. Thank you in advance.

For more information on and training in the Stop the Bleed program in RI, please go to these links: www.facebook.com/operationstopthebleedri or www.riema.ri.gov.

Betty M. Gordon 

Warwick