South County Fire is celebrating a lifesaving milestone this month: More than 10,000 people have now been trained in ACT First Aid & CPR.

ACT is a free, one-hour class focused on three skills to make a lifesaving difference in the minutes before emergency responders arrive:

• A: Antidote for opioid overdose
• C: CPR and AED for sudden cardiac arrest
• T: Tourniquet and wound packing for bleeding control

“The simplicity of the program allows us to quickly train schools and diverse communities to have the skills and confidence to make a difference – most likely to those that are closest to you,” said South County Fire Deputy Chief of Emergency Medical Services Shaughn Maxwell. “Now, instead of training hundreds of community members each year we can train thousands.”

ACT provides an innovative approach to making community first aid accessible and relevant for modern society, he explained in a South County Fire news release. “Our goal is to improve the chain of survival for everyone in our community by removing barriers, such as cost and time commitment, and focusing on today’s most predominant life-threatening challenges.”

South County Fire launched ACT in 2018 with monthly classes, group presentations and hands-on demonstrations at community events. During the pandemic, ACT moved online and gained traction as more people became proficient in the use of Zoom.

Most of the people trained are local, but online training has brought ACT to a wider audience including people in Oregon, Idaho, California, Florida, Canada, Thailand, France and the Philippines.

Here’s how you can learn ACT First Aid & CPR: Register for a free monthly, online ACT First Aid & CPR at www.southsnofire.org/ACT. The next date is April 20 with classes offered at 10 a.m. and 6 p.m.