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World Restart a Heart

Also: Restart a Heart Day · European Restart a Heart Day

“All citizens of the world can save a life”

CPR awareness and mass-training day on and around 16 October. The European Resuscitation Council held the first European Restart a Heart Day in 2013 (theme 'Children Save Lives'); Resuscitation Council UK runs the UK day with the British Heart Foundation, ambulance services and others; ILCOR made it global in 2018 with the message 'Check, Call, Compress'.

Years
2013–now
Reach
570.7M reached as reported
“Self-reported by participating councils: at least 12.6 million people trained and 570.7 million reached, 2018-2023 (Rott et al.”
Country
BelgiumUnited Kingdom
Topic
Cardiac arrestCardiovascular
Asks people to
RecognizeStart
Strategy
Collective challengeSelf efficacySimple instruction
Channel
EventsSchoolSocial (organic)
Audience
General publicYouth

Evidence

ObservationalUnknown

Self-reported by participating councils: at least 12.6 million people trained and 570.7 million reached, 2018-2023 (Rott et al. 2025); 2019 alone over 5.4 million trained (Bottiger et al. 2020). In West Yorkshire, bystander CPR for witnessed cardiac arrest rose from 38.4% (2014) to 69.7% (2018), with the largest gains in postcode districts with high Restart a Heart activity (+34.3 points), but the association was not statistically significant (Lockey et al. 2021).

Sponsor (who paid)

  • International Liaison Committee on Resuscitation (ILCOR) NGO, global lead since 2018
  • European Resuscitation Council NGO, founder (2013)
  • Resuscitation Council UK NGO, UK lead

Credits (who made it)

Not recorded yet.

Related campaigns

Sources

  1. Rott N et al. ILCOR World Restart a Heart - Spreading global CPR awareness and empowering communities to save lives since 2018. Resusc Plus 2025;21:100853 history · 2025 · DOI 10.1016/j.resplu.2024.100853 · PMID 39868345
  2. Bottiger BW et al. Up to 206 Million People Reached and Over 5.4 Million Trained in CPR Worldwide: The 2019 ILCOR World Restart a Heart Initiative. J Am Heart Assoc 2020;9:e017230 evaluation · 2020 · DOI 10.1161/JAHA.120.017230 · PMID 32750297
  3. Lockey AS et al. Impact of community initiatives on non-EMS bystander CPR rates in West Yorkshire between 2014 and 2018. Resusc Plus 2021;6:100115 evaluation · 2021 · DOI 10.1016/j.resplu.2021.100115 · PMID 34223375
  4. Resuscitation Council UK (Wikipedia) reference

Research notes

Rott 2025 full text read (Europe PMC): ERC launched the European Restart a Heart idea in 2012 after a European Parliament written declaration; first ERHD 2013 in 20+ countries; ILCOR WRAH from 2018 (first year: 12.7 million reached, 675,000 trained); training numbers are self-reported by councils and 'cannot be evaluated independently'. Rott says the UK's 2018 impact was CPR becoming mandatory in the English school curriculum, credited to the campaign by its own authors. UK Restart a Heart Day start year (2014) inferred from Lockey 2021, not confirmed on a RCUK page. Country codes: BE (ERC, Niel) and GB; the initiative is global.

Record cases/ilcor-world-restart-a-heart.json, updated 2026-10-23· Link to this campaign