HALF an hour.

That’s all it takes to teach someone CPR. To me, it’s a life skill. Everyone should learn how to swim and everyone should know how to do CPR.

Saving one person’s life has an impact on everyone they know and their family.

Sudden cardiac death is not an old person’s problem. It happens to young people. It happens to young people for a variety of reasons, cardiac rhythm problems, people with an undiagnosed cardiovascular disease. It's not just old people that it happens to.

For every minute that passes your chances of survival drops by 10%. If you stand and do nothing for three minutes, the chances are they will have no cerebral function. After five minutes, the chances of getting them back to life are virtually zero.

I am conscious of the fact that a lot of money has already been spent and some of the equipment is already in schools. I see it as an ideal opportunity for the older pupils, the pupils in fifth and sixth year, to work towards a citizenship award by teaching the younger pupils.

Since the Save a Life for Scotland campaign was introduced, the number of people who suffer an out of hospital cardiac arrest who receive on-the-spot resuscitation has increased to 50%.

We need to make sure if anyone collapses there’s a bystander there willing to have a go.

It just takes one person to be brave enough to say: ‘I’ll have a go’. It’s phoning an ambulance, putting one hand in front of another, and putting them in the middle of someone’s chest and pushing up and down, that’s it. That’s all we need people to do. It’s not complicated and it saves lives.

The findings from a study in Denmark show the kids who are taught CPR go home and encourage other people in their house to learn it as well.

That’s half-an-hour well spent.

Elizabeth Simpson, lecturer in adult nursing at Glasgow Caledonian University, and course organiser for the British Heart Foundation Heartstart programme.