Senior Magen David Adom paramedics are holding training sessions at synagogues in seven California locations, including Poway, four years after a shooter killed one person and injured three others at Chabad of Poway, Calif., on Passover.
According to a news release, the training is focused on saving lives as soon as a terror act occurs, especially in the first seven minutes before first-responding emergency services arrive. Israel’s “national Red Cross Society,” Magen David Adom, is the country’s official rescue agency.
90-minute lectures are followed by simulations in which students role-play “victims” and unharmed spectators who become rescuers. At Chabad of Poway, the first session began on May 15, 2019, four years after the shooting in April 2019.
La Jolla, San Diego, Laguna Niguel, Los Angeles, Foster City, and San Rafael have planned additional training sessions.
Raphael Herbst, a senior paramedic at Magen David Adom, told JNS that the “first seven minutes” training is about empowering communities and assuring them to know that by banding together, they can act to save lives immediately following an attack or disaster before first responders arrive.
He continued, “It was particularly poignant to be here at Chabad of Poway, and we pray that this community never again experiences a tragedy like the one they did four years ago.”
After his paramedic uncle passed away while delivering relief at the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, Herbst was motivated to pursue a career in paramedicine.
This instruction goes beyond teaching participants how to stop bleeding. It’s about finding safety while the threat is still present and acting promptly after an occurrence to make sure that first responders are aware of the location of the injured and can get them to possibly life-saving medical care as soon as possible, he told JNS.
JOIN US ON WHAT'SAPP, TO GET INSTANT STATUS UPDATES AND BE IN THE KNOW.
CLICK HERE
