In England and Wales, there were approximately 46,000 offences committed involving a knife or sharp instrument in the year ending March 2020. Knife crime is at the highest recorded level in the past 10 years and in the year ending March 2019, there were 259 homicides using a sharp instrument. The area most badly affected by this was London, where a rate of 179 offences involving a knife per 100,000 population was recorded in 2019/20.

Knife crime has been a consistent problem in Britain, and this is represented adequately by the hospital admissions data for knife assaults. Doctors are treating more severe injuries and younger victims are becoming a regularity in hospital emergency departments.

While knife crime appears to be on the rise, the number of deaths from being assaulted with a sharp instrument may be about to have a downturn.

Preventing blood loss from stab wounds

An innovative student from Loughborough University has invented a device which could help save hundreds of lives every year. Joseph Bentley, the student in question, has invented REACT, a new product that uses pressure at the site of stab wounds to prevent blood loss.

The device has two components: 1) a silicon sleeve called a ‘tamponade’ and 2) a handheld ‘actuator’. Where a patient is suffering from an open stab wound, the tamponade can be inserted into the opening and inflated to prevent blood from exiting the body. The actuator is calibrated for each specific region of the body to equal the pressure of exiting blood. By applying internal pressure, Bentley claims that the device can prevent bleeding within 30 seconds. Bentley gave his thoughts on the invention:

‘I know several friends who have been the unfortunate victims of knife crime, thankfully none of the incidents were fatal. I am haunted almost daily by news of someone who has lost their life because of knife crime. There were five murders in three days this spring bank holiday. Having something that’s on the scene with the police, this life-saving first aid they can carry and immediately administer, I think is the absolute goal for this project’.

Mr Bentley wishes his device to be carried by all emergency services once it is perfected and hopes that it can make a difference on the streets of the UK.

Can other tech innovations save lives?

Life-saving technology is nothing new, but increasing the availability, access, and amount of it is an ongoing cause. We currently have brilliant inventions like the at-home defibrillator, which has clear applications in homes where heart problems are a concern. That will not be helpful though, if proper care cannot arrive in time to help.

This is the thought process of Alec Momont, a graduate of the University of Delft, where he designed an ambulance drone to help people in distress. The device travels up to 100kph and can reduce emergency response time from 10 minutes to just 1 minute. The best part about this piece of kit is that it works by communicating with your phone. Should somebody require emergency assistance, they can call for help and the ambulance drone will drop of urgent medical supplies at their location by getting a fix on the GPS locater in their handset.

Rightly so, Momont received a Frame Public Award in 2015 and is now an associate design director for Frog Design in San Francisco. Innovators like Momont and Bentley are making progress which could ultimately save lives and change how the world works. Ambulances and conventional medicine have served us well until now, but the truth is that a future exists where the world has outstandingly good technology to look after us, and not just to entertain us.

What does the future look like for life-saving tech?

Films have shown us that technology can do amazing things if we can imagine hard enough. Iron Man had his arc reactor, James Bond had x-ray glasses, and let’s not get started on what went on in Star Trek. The future of life-saving technology is a bright one and the reality is that if we can imagine it, the chances are we will be able to make it a reality sooner or later.

The problem of innovation is cost. Experimenting with new ideas can become a costly and time-consuming adventure and regrettably, the number of life-saving devices out there will have suffered for these reasons. If Joseph Bentley’s REACT device is to really make it into every ambulance, police car, and fire engine then he will certainly need a plentiful supply of patience and money. I would hope that for a device that could save so many lives, the government or another large organisation can see the benefits of this invention as well as we can.

About the Author: Isaac Knowles

Isaac Knowles is a contributing current affairs Features writer. He focuses on social issues which face everyday people and has written on topics such as race, feminism, and poverty. While endeavouring to write in-depth pieces that make real-world impacts, Isaac has developed significant expertise in the fields of politics, economics, and human rights.