One of the biggest and most visible responses to a number of high profile stabbing tragedies in Bristol over the past couple of years has been the roll out of bright red bleed kit boxes in community buildings, supermarkets and sports clubs across the city. And now the roll out of more than 200 of the bleed kits has gone to another place where serious emergency first aid might well be needed – building sites.
The Lord Mayor of Bristol, Cllr Andrew Varney, did the honours on Wednesday to unveil a bleed kit cabinet at a building site close to Temple Meads station. Leeds-based construction firm GMI are getting underway building new student accommodation close to The Dings, and have teamed up with Leanne Reynolds and her initiative for the Daniel Baird Foundation, to install a bleed kit on their site, as part of their health and safety cover and first aid provision.
Leanne has led the way in seeing bleed kits installed around the city, following the killing of Dontae Davis back in October 2021, and after persuading and encouraging everyone from Asda supermarkets to boxing clubs and youth clubs, she said getting them onto building sites is another step forward.
The bright red wall-mounted boxes work in a similar way to community defibrillators and can be accessed by a code given to someone who has dialled 999. The bleed kit initiative began as a response to the 2017 murder of Daniel Baird, a 26-year-old who was stabbed outside a pub in Birmingham. His parents set up the Daniel Baird Foundation to try to get first aid kits to stop serious blood loss distributed into every community and workplace.
“The kits aren’t just for people who have been stabbed, it could be any kind of injury that is causing serious blood loss,” explained Leanne. Leanne is the south west rep for the Daniel Baird Foundation and, as well as bleed kits, the charity works on awareness training, workshops and support if the bleed kits end up being used in a real-life incident.
“This is the first location in this area, and construction companies are actually in partnership with us in Bristol, which is really nice,” added Leanne. “It’s very important that they are everywhere. This is cabinet number 33 in the city, and there’s over 200 stand-alone kits out in the city, which has taken me three or four years. It’s really important for people to understand that we do need them, because ambulance services are taking a long time to come out and the NHS is under pressure, so it’s having that accessibility while you are for emergency services,” she added.
Lord Mayor Andrew Varney said he would like to see a bleed kit cabinet alongside every defibrillator in the city. “Bristol in recent years has had a real problem with knife crime,” he said. “We know that those lives could possibly have been saved. It’s really fantastic that so many organisations, including Leanne’s, are stepping up and trying to make a change and have bleed kits in areas that might be a prominent area.
“It’s absolutely fantastic to see. It’s important to remember that it’s not just about victims of crime. We’re surrounded by construction sites here. People have accidents in the workplace, or even just walking along the street, and having a bleed kit to hand could mean the difference between life and death. So it’s really important and really crucial. I would love to see bleed kits alongside every defibrillator, so people will know where they are,” he added.