MANHATTAN — The City Council will vote Wednesday afternoon on legislation that would require the city to provide lifesaving defibrillators at all youth baseball league games and practices.
The bill, which is sponsored by Council Members Steven Matteo and Corey Johnson, would mandate the city provide automated external defibrillators for free to leagues playing on city-owned land.
"The simple fact is that AEDs save lives," Johnson, chair of the Committee on Health, said in a statement. "We have the opportunity to prevent needless deaths, but we must take action to expand the availability of these devices.”
If passed, the city would have to provide AED training to coaches and umpires with the goal of saving kids in cardiac arrest, the leading cause of death for youth athletes.
Leagues would be required to bring AEDs to every game and practice and ensure a trained coach or umpire is present.
“Sudden cardiac arrest is the number one cause of death in this country, and among the leading cause of death in young athletes,” Matteo said. “An automated external defibrillator is a person’s best chance of surviving a SCA.”
