Excerpts from chicago.gov:
In a first for Major League Baseball, the Chicago Cubs have taken an important step to keep fans, staff, and players safe in case a bleeding emergency occurs by installing trauma kits at Wrigley Field.
During the offseason, the Cubs worked with the City of Chicago’s Office of Emergency Management and Communications (OEMC), as part of their Safe Chicago initiative, to install American College of Surgeons STOP THE BLEED® kits around Wrigley Field and train ballpark staff and Cubs associates on how to respond if someone is bleeding from an injury. A person can bleed to death in as little as five minutes, and it is estimated that 57% of civilian deaths from blood loss could have been prevented if proper bleeding control techniques were applied.*
The Wrigley Field staff and Cubs associates who have been trained to STOP THE BLEED® learned the three basic techniques of bleeding control: apply direct pressure, pack the wound, or apply a tourniquet. Anyone can take the course to equip themselves with the skills necessary to save a life in a bleeding emergency. Every kit installed includes a sticker with a QR code that links to an online version of the STOP THE BLEED® course.
The STOP THE BLEED® program has already trained more than 2.6 million people around the world and helped advocate for state and local legislation to install STOP THE BLEED® kits in schools and public places and train the public in these lifesaving techniques. Every trauma kit that has been installed includes a tourniquet, wound packing gauze, a space blanket, trauma shears, an instructional manual, gloves, and a marker.
OEMC’s Safe Chicago initiative has helped make bleeding control kits and training widely accessible throughout the City of Chicago. Safe Chicago was launched in 2019 by OEMC in partnership with the Chicago Fire Department, Chicago Police Department, the Chicago Department of Assets, Information & Services, and the ACS STOP THE BLEED® program. The Safe Chicago program is funded by a grant from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Urban Areas Security Initiative (UASI).
STOP THE BLEED® was launched in October 2015 by the White House, with a call to action to begin training more people to become immediate responders during a bleeding emergency until professional help arrives. The ACS STOP THE BLEED® program is operated under a licensing agreement granted by the Department of Defense.
More information is available at the STOP THE BLEED® website which has details on how to get trained.
