According to Councillor Edward Heron, Hampshire county council’s executive lead member for environment and transport strategy, the plans to install defibrillators across the county’s HWRCs have been in the making for a couple of months.
However, the decision was fast-tracked after an incident at the Marchwood HWRC where Martin Lucas, 60, suffered a heart attack while dumping garden waste. Paramedics fought to save his life, but he died after a few days in an intensive care unit of Southampton’s University Hospital.
Defibrillators are portable devices that deliver an electric shock to the heart if it stops
beating normally.
Cllr Heron commented: “I’m pleased to say that our waste contractor Veolia has secured 26 units from St John Ambulance and expect to receive those by the end of June, with a view to them being installed on sites as quickly as is reasonably practicable.”
He added that the defibrillators are being installed at the 24 HWRCs in Hampshire and also the HWRCs in Paulsgrove, Portsmouth, and Millbrook, Southampton.
The Hampshire county council’s HWRCs are run by Veolia. The council wrote to Veolia in the aftermath of the contract to outline that it wants defibrillators to be rolled out quicker.
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