Over my several years as a doorman, I’ve had to attend a few first aid courses. The theory being that we’re meant to be their to look after the customers, and that could conceivable include giving them mouth to mouth in the case of them trying to pop their clogs in our establishments.

Obviously, the likelihood of said customers being nothing more than incubators for many nasty diseases is quite high, as is the likelihood of them doing their very best to either bite us or chunder all over us. So some of the establishments I’ve worked in have been nice enough to offer little one-way plastic valves to us, allowing us to ensure that the customer gets the life-giving, yet foul smelling, benefit of our breath, while we don’t get the dubious benefit of a taste of their partially digested dinner.

Now, in my years on the door, I’ve never seen anyone need mouth to mouth, let alone be in a position to have to give it. For which I’m very thankful. But various laws, council policies and insurance company instructions require me to be current in the theory of it; the implication being that I would then be bound by various rules to give first aid, including chest compressions and mouth to mouth, should the situation arise.

There are similar rules for the day job, which is why I spent yesterday afternoon playing with Resussi-Anne and a few doctors and nurses. Where I discovered that, apparently, the giving of mouth to mouth is entirely optional, based upon the moral and ethical feeling of the giver at the time. Because of the possibility of getting a disease or the unpleasantness of the chunder, apparently.

This confused me; why was this choice never mentioned in the door courses? Why were we told we had an obligation to help in a dark room full of drunks while office workers and doctors are told to make their own decision? Is it because doormen are thought of as to daft to make that decision, or because a drunken twat who’s tongue has been swollen by narcotics is more worthy of saving than the guy who’s given himself a cardiac arrest by lugging a toner cartridge up six flights of stairs?

I can see why there should be a choice there, I really can, but why wasn’t it mentioned by the various council officers and ambulance types who trained me recently? Eh?