Am I wrong in feeling that if you came across an older teenage girl unconscious on the pavement you should stop and help her?

[erikbloodaxe]

Because no one else wanted to help me help her and one woman even said her dog (she was walking it at the time) wouldn't want to wait.

My aunt collapsed with a heart attack in the street and she was actually spat on for being ‘drunk’ in the day. Not all that long ago. Unimaginable.

Not saying I don’t believe these stories but I seem to see people injure themselves all the time. Someone fell off the kerb flat on their face as they were reading a phone whilst walking. Tons of people stopped to help and that’s what I routinely observe. I live in a v small city, maybe it’s that’s. Maybe people drinking others are cautious of.

So many people wouldn't. I remember not so long ago coming out of a shopping centre and there was a man face down in the middle of the pavement, next to a bus stop. Everyone was looking, whilst they boarded the bus! It was insane. As everyone got on the bus and th bus left, it was just me and this poor man. I went back into th centre and told two security who came out to him and took over/called emergency services. I still cannot believe not one single person did anything at all. I was clearly visibly shaken as a man simply said "pft, what do u expect, we're in - enter town name here-" I mean, what's that supposed to mean?? That poor guy, face down. Noone could possibly know what happened.

I was in a bad place, went out into the night and took a load of tablets... rolled under a bench. I can't recall much, except I woke up hours later and the bit of cash (about £40) was gone from my purse.
No one had called for help or stayed with me. Just robbed me.

@XenoBitch

Thats awful. I hope you’re doing better now 😊

I used to think it was common and normal to stop and help, especially a young female. Obviously you help anyone you can but there's certain scenarios I probably would call emergency services and leave just for my own safety.
When I was about 15 I saw an elderly lady fall and called an ambulance. I asked for help but no one stopped. It was a busy road and people were rushing to work. I got a detention for that and I'm still fuming about it.

I rang for an ambulance for someone who was lying on the pavement once, looked like he was fitting, and the "patient" got to his feet and walked off, as if it had not happened !

Similar, sadly. In central Manchester there are often people on the streets, presumably asleep but I don't check them. If it was somewhere more remote I would stop.

I really hate that everyone gets their phones out these days! Accident, emergency, incident, the first thing people do is get their phones out and start filming. It's disgusting! There was an incident near my home recently, an unfortunate man was on a bridge threatening to jump off - with a crowd of people at the bottom filming him. What were they planning to do with that film? Watch it again and again? Post it online for likes? It's just so disgusting.
I would not be able to walk past and ignore someone in need of help. Standards in society have declined.

This is a good point. I know someone who went into some kind of state due to her pancreas failing and another on a bus who had a brain anerysm. In the first scenario no one helped her, luckily she managed to call her husband and he realised what was going on, in the other scenario she got off the bus, collapsed and finally someone stopped and called an ambulance. Sad stuff.

My first thought reading that was the phone ringer was physically disabled, or elderly and unable to do much more.

I never thought about Autism being a reason. But another thought is they maybe had small children to keep an eye on so couldn't leave the children.

People can't have it both ways.

It's not allowed nowadays to tell kids that aren't yours anything, or interfere in what they are doing or discipline them or whatever, so you can't expect people to get involved when they need help.

Also, no one wants to be accused of touching a kid.

Consequences of modern hysteria is all a rod for parents own backs 🤷‍♀️

in the scenario where the injured child’s parent is clearly there but can’t get to them it just isn’t a problem ‘ would you like me to help him up while you get your younger child of the bike’

When I was a gothy looking teen I was walking near my house and saw a toddler appear at speed from a gap in the trees and run directly into the A road I was walking alongside, tripping over the kerb and face planting in front of the oncoming car.
I ran to her as quickly as I could and yanked her out of the road moments before that car would of killed her at exactly that moment her mum appears from the same gap in the tree and starts screaming at me to get ‘my disgusting hands off her child’

So I can understand why many people don’t want to stick their neck out.

I have also been punched in the face by a woman whose boyfriend was laying into her in a busy high street in broad daylight.
I grabbed him and started telling him to leave her alone and she swung for me and started screaming to leave her man alone 🤷‍♀️

it’s hasn’t stopped me from scooping up unconscious men from the road or quizzing the guy half carrying half dragging and out of it woman off to make sure he actually knew her!

They only time I have seen an incident and not stopped was when I was heavily pregnant and there was a lot of blood. It was outside a supermarket and the staff saw it too so I left it to them to deal with.
had there been no one around I’d have called an ambulance but nothing in this world would have made me take my unborn baby near all that strangers blood.

Phoebo · Yesterday 22:21
If she was obviously drunk then I can see why people left her”

Why? A young, drunk person could be in serious trouble. Alcohol poisoning, not to mention spiking. You’d call for medical assistance, surely?

Do you think it depends on where in the country you are?

We live in Cornwall. If anyone is ever in need of assistance, lots of people rush to help, I can’t imagine the situation, ever, of a person being left unconscious in the street. Even when it’s something like a clear drug overdose - one town in particular, where I used to work, has real issues with this - there are still people there straight away.

I’ve lived in a city though where I don’t think the responses would have been the same.

Out of interest, why did you accept no from the ambulance service -who’s remit this is in?

but make two calls to insist the police came? Why not call the ambulance back?

genuine question? People slag of the police on here yet also expect them to pick up the slack from other services.

Ambulances don't just leave people without help for hours for the sake of it. The reason that they say a wait time of that length is because there are other people also in need of ambulances, ambulances stuck in queues outside of A&E, not enough ambulances and crews.

I don't really understand what you think phoning back the ambulance service will achieve? They get to everybody as quickly as they can, obviously prioritising urgent risk to life over someone with a less urgent problem. They didn't say they wouldn't come, just warned OP to expect a long wait.

I assume that the police initially said they would not attend and then OP called back and insisted so they did.

The only other service I could think to call in that situation would be social services. But although I know they do tend to have emergency/duty social workers, I don't know if they would send someone out in a car. You'd hope so I suppose, it would make more sense than police/ambulance. But perhaps it doesn't occur to people since they aren't listed as an emergency service nor accessible via 999.

When I was a teenager, I called an ambulance for someone passed out on a grass verge. He wouldn't respond when I asked him if he was OK. When the ambulance turned up the guy just stood up and walked off and the paramedic had a go at me for wasting thier time. Nothing was said to the bloke who obviously heard me talking to him and heard the phone call. Thinking back now as an adult I put myself in a dangerous position waiting alone with a man who was potentially very drunk.

Recently in local news an old man got beaten up after asking a drunk man if he was OK.

If I saw someone passed out now I would call for medical assistance from a distance. I would not risk my personal safety to help out a stranger.

People can be so odd. When my DD was in her late teens she was followed into a station and onto a train by a weird man, he sat diagonally to her and kept staring at her. She moved carriages, he followed.

A group of middle aged women noticed all this, and when the guy went to the loo, they asked her if she knew him. She said no and said she was really scared etc. They all got off at the next stop and left her there!!

It’s not the Police’s job though which will be why they refused to attend.

calling the ambulance back will at least record demand and show in their failure to meet targets stats, which hopefully provides evidence they need more funding.

every police thread on here is “the police won’t do anything”, “the police don’t care”, “the police should be catching criminals” and other negativity.

this is why. Ambulance can’t meet demand so the police have to pick up the slack, and then they get stick for not doing what they’re supposed to be doing.

I did first aid training and we were told you need to single people out and give them clear instructions if you want help. So if people are gawping call out one person and get them to move people on and so on, making it clear who you're talking to.

I think the problem is that people are scared and not without good reason.

A person lying on the floor in the street aparently unconscious could be under the influence of alcohol or drugs and maybe extremely dangerous if roused or you get close to them.

It could also be a gang ruse to get people to come close to them to steal or pickpocket but the bigger risk is violent attack from someone unstable.

It would matter less if there was a collective culture of helping - so if you knew that if you went over and the person lept up to attack you - that you could rely on other strangers to help you. The fact that culture of helpign others has died means that people realised if they go to help they are on their own and vulnerable - it means that even nice decent people who think about helping are deterred from doing it.

It's sad but a feature of the way we live now. 200 years ago people lived in communities, relocated less often and new everyone. A person lying on the street in the local village or town would be known to the community or even if they weren't, there would be a community who knew each other and would back each other up if a stranger reacted violently to help. As a way of life this is really dead even in most of the smallest communities because of second home owners/ air bnb.

Fear. That's the problem. Fear.

but you have to be realistic about the situation. Late at night, lone woman, see someone having fits? I will keep my distance and call emergency services and only leave if i really feel as though I'm in danger.

Middle of the day, well lit? yeah, I'll stop to help. And i will give instructions to others to call emergency services, keep people moving past. And if they ignore me and walk off? i'll get the next person. If they start filming? I will loudly and clearly say that i asked this person to help and they are just being a twat. Very loudly and clearly so that their film is unuseable for anything other than to show that at least one person was helping (yes, i can talk and do 1st aid)

TBH I've had to do this on a few occasions, and it works well. I used to be in the army, my command voice is effective. And i have done a LOT of first aid courses over my life (I'm usually the company first aider). So i don't look as though I'm flailing around helplessly

I think a lot of people just can’t be arsed sorry.