Caring community members have stepped in to offer life-saving facilities.
Jeremy Meadowcroft of Rastrick Junior Football Club has arranged for a defibrillator to be installed at a key location in the community.
And in Kirkburton, the Rotary Club of Denby Dale and District has arranged for one to be installed in a cabinet outside the health centre.
If a person is suffering cardiac arrest, a defibrillator can be used to deliver a shock to the heart to help re-start it.
In Rastrick, the equipment has been installed on the front wall of resident Colin Peel’s home at Carr Green Lane.
Generous Colin stepped in to offer his premises as the installation point after no other nearby location was deemed suitable.
Jeremy said Colin’s house was a perfect site as it was close to playing fields, a cemetery and the local school.
He said: “The defibrillator needs a power supply and we have no electricity in our clubhouse. The school can’t be used as it has to be locked up and the council refused to put it on their wall. Colin said he would put it up, it’s absolutely fantastic he’s come to our aid.
“It’s a perfect location as the field has everyone on it from children to dog walkers and then there are all the people visiting the cemetery.”
Jeremy travelled to Sky Sports studios near London to have his defibrillator scheme endorsed by former Premier League footballer Fabrice Muamba, who was on set filming the Fantasy Football show. Fabrice is fronting the Arythmia Alliance’s campaign Hearts and Goals following his own high profile cardiac arrest in 2012.
The then Bolton midfielder collapsed on the pitch at Tottenham during a live televised FA cup game and was clinically dead for 78 minutes.
But he made a miraculously recovery and has been campaigning for greater awareness that sudden cardiac arrest does not discriminate based on age, fitness or any other factors.
The condition is now the UK’s biggest killer, claiming 100,000 lives every year.
Jeremy said members of the community needed to be aware how easy it was to use the life saving equipment.
He said: “If people are frightened of using it it’s not going to save lives.
“You can’t do anything wrong, as soon as you press a button it talks to you and tells you exactly what to do.”
In Kirkburton a defibrillator at the village health centre has been moved from inside to an outside wall to make it available at all times. Rotary Club members made the arrangements with help from Kirkburton Parish Council and hope to install another defibrillator elsewhere.
