With the help of Fabrice Muamba, we've now handed in our petition to Downing Street, signed by over 100,000 people calling for life-saving skills to be taught in all schools in England. Petitions have also been handed into the Welsh and Northern Irish Assemblies with Scotland soon to follow.

In England, the UK Government's consultation on the content of the curriculum has now closed. We’re waiting to hear if decision makers will make life-saving skills mandatory. After all, having Emergency Life Support (ELS) skills should be as important as learning to read and write.

MPs debated the issue in Parliament with the majority supporting the motion to teach all children life-saving skills and raising this issue with Education Minister, Elizabeth Truss.

Join the fight across the UK

In England, email your local MP about the campaign

In Wales, email your local AMs

In Northern Ireland we've had some great news. Since handing in the petition and hundreds of emails being sent to MLAs, the Health Minister announced the development of a community resuscitation strategy. This will aim to increase the number of people surviving an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest and includes a commitment to creating greater coverage of training for life-saving skills in communities, schools and workplaces throughout Northern Ireland.

In Scotland, as a result of the campaign, the Government has awarded BHF Scotland a fund of £110,000. The money will be used to develop sustainable models to increase provision of ELS training in secondary schools by working with a designated number of local authorities. This is a great achivement for us and will help move us closer to seeing every child leaving school knowing how to save a life.

Don't forget, we rely on your generous donations to help train young people in life-saving skills. Donate today.

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The campaign so far

We collected more than 100,000 signatures on our ELS petition. Thousands of you have been emailing your local politicians and helping us put pressure on decision-makers to ensure all children know how to save a life.

Working with our Heartstart schools, we've arranged for several politicians to visit schools in their constituencies. They've witnessed ELS training in action and seen how effective and easy it can be to learn these vital skills. Ed Miliband MP and Nick Clegg MP are just some of the high profile visitors to our Heartstart schools.

The Sun decided to back our campaign calling for young people to be taught Emergency Life Support (ELS) skills in school, after footballer Fabrice Muamba, who's also supporting the campaign, received CPR when he collapsed during a match.

We've now handed in petitions across the UK and we are starting to see some positive outcomes as a result of the campaign.

We hope that the announcement in Northern Ireland about the development of a resuscitation strategy and Scotland's commitment to increase provision of ELS in secondary schools will inspire other governments to follow suit and save more lives.

What is ELS?

When someone is having a heart attack, has serious bleeding, choking, is unconscious or in cardiac arrest, knowing what to do to help keep them alive until professional help arrives can give their chances of survival a significant boost. The skills you need for this are called Emergency Life Support skills, or ELS.

CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation), taught in schools as part of ELS, might double a casualty’s chances of survival from a cardiac arrest.

What are we asking for?

• In England, we're fighting for ELS skills to be a mandatory part of the Curriculum.
• In Scotland, we believe ELS skills should be taught in every school as part of the Curriculum for Excellence.
• In Wales, we want to see ELS skills taught in every school as a compulsory part of PSE (Personal and Social Education).
• And in Northern Ireland we believe further investment aimed at raising awareness of, and access to, ELS skills in schools, workplaces and communities will help save lives.