Mouth to Mouth

The American National Red Cross made it official: the preferred method of artificial respiration is for the rescuer to put his mouth to the victim's and breathe air into the victim's lungs about twelve times a minute. For children, the Red Cross recommends shallower breaths, a rate of about 20 to the minute.

Already approved by the National Academy of Sciences-National Research Council, and used by the U.S. armed forces, the mouth-to-mouth revival method is both the simplest and the oldest known to man. It returns to favor after years of reliance on such awkward physical maneuvers as the Shafer prone-pressure system and the Nielsen back-pressure, arm-lift method. Neither of these gets as much air into a victim's lungs as simply breathing into them after clearing the mouth, throat and windpipe of obstructions. For rescuers who cannot stomach direct contact with a person who may be dead, a plastic tube is already on the market. Or, says the Red Cross, they can breathe through a porous cloth.

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