A heroic female police officer, Pc Melissa Allen-Turner (24), saved a five-year-old girl, Edlyn Marques' life by performing chest compressions on her after she stopped breathing due to an asthma attack.
Pc Allen-Turner was directing traffic with her colleague, Pc Dawn Flanagan, in Southall, on 23rd June 2015, when they were alerted.
She said, “I was at one end of the road, Pc Flanagan was further away. A member of the public came up to her, and then I noticed her run in the other direction. I hadn't heard what had been said, but I just ran after her. As I was running I lost [my colleague], then members of the public were shouting 'she's in the car, she's in the car' and then pointed to a car that was stopped. I looked at the car and I saw the father shouting 'she's not breathing' and pointing at his little girl in the car. So I took her out, put her on the curb and started CPR."
Within minutes, police officers from a nearby station and paramedics joined them and the child was rushed to hospital. The paramedics had told Pc Allen-Turner that thanks to her intervention, the child had made a full recovery.
On saving a life, Pc Allen-Turner said, “It feels good to have saved her life, to see her family and to see she's alright. But it falls within the remit of what we do everyday.”
