St John Ambulance launches national campaign urging workplaces to better prepare for traumatic injuries and mass casualty incidents

England’s leading first aid charity St John Ambulance has launched a national campaign urging businesses to better prepare their workforce to respond to traumatic injuries in the workplace – from accidents to knife crime, terrorist attacks and mass casualty incidents.

The need for holistic responses to traumatic injuries has risen sharply over recent years, with more than 50,000 offences involving knives in England and Wales recorded in 2024.

In tandem, St John Ambulance research* shows when it comes to first aid trauma response, only four in 10 people know how to treat a severe bleed or do CPR and less than half know how to give basic back blows to a person choking.

Lisa Sharman, Head of Education and Commercial Training at St John Ambulance, said, “Our findings – and the occurrence of tragedies like the one just experienced in Liverpool – underly the urgency of our campaign. We are urging organisations to step up their staff training for response to major traumatic incidents.”

St John Ambulance’s specialist courses, including First Responder on Scene and First Response Emergency Care Level 3, equip workers to operate as emergency responders in situations such as catastrophic bleeding and neck and spinal injuries.

St John Ambulance Workplace First Aid Training Courses range from First Aid and Emergency First Aid at Work, to specialist training on defibrillators, pediatric first aid, annual refreshers and more.

St John Ambulance is also one of the most trusted providers for first aid training, with organisations across England rating their courses at 4.9 out of 5, based on more than 40,000 reviews.