Wembley stand named in honour of Sunderland fan who survived cardiac arrest at Championship final
A Wembley Stadium stand is being temporarily named after a young Sunderland fan who suffered a heart attack at a football game in May last year.
Callum Lawson, 22, suffered a cardiac arrest while watching Sunderland AFC defeat Sheffield United 2-1 at last year’s Championship Play-Off Final at Wembley.
Callum survived thanks to the quick actions of fellow Sunderland fans and the Wembley medical team, who administered CPR and defibrillation before transferring Callum to hospital.
He said: “Last year, I came to Wembley hoping to watch Sunderland win at the Play-Off Final with my family, but I collapsed shortly after we scored the first goal.
"While I didn’t quite get to see them win on the day, to be returning one year later to see a stand named after me is hard to put into words."
Speaking about the incident last year, Callum’s dad, Darren Lawson, said: “Traumatic doesn’t even begin to cover it.
"I knew CPR – I’d been taught at work – but I was so emotionally overloaded I just froze.
"One minute we were watching the game, the next he’d turned white and collapsed.
"I honestly thought we’d lost him.
"If it weren’t for the heros of red and white, I’m not sure he’d still be here.”
Callum already had a pre-existing heart condition when he suffered the cardiac arrest, and has since had his pacemaker upgraded to include an Implantable Cardioverter-Defibrillator (ICD).
An ICD is a small electrical device that is put under the skin of a patient’s chest to monitor the heart’s rhythm, sending small electric shocks to the heart to get it to beat normally if it detects any abnormalities.
To inspire football fans to learn the lifesaving skills of CPR, four stands at Wembley will be temporarily re-named for the duration of the 40th Sky Bet EFL Play-Offs, held between May 23 and 25.
Stands are being named after Callum, Pippa Sharman, a Reading fan who helped save the life of an opposition supporter when they collapsed at the wheel of their car after a game, Andy Wall, a Norwich City fan who collapsed moments before the half-time whistle while watching the Canaries, and Ed McCann, a Bradford City fan who survived a cardiac arrest with the help of a Burnley supporter who performed CPR.
Sky Bet and the British Heart Foundation have also launched an Every Minute Matters initiative, supported by the EFL, to encourage as many people as possible to learn CPR.
Callum said: “I’m only here today because people acted quickly and performed CPR – when I needed it most.
"It’s been a long year and a life-changing experience, but it’s also shown me how important campaigns like Every Minute Matters are.
"Cardiac arrest doesn’t care about your age, and I hope football fans across the country see this and realise they could be the difference for someone one day.”
Every year in the UK, more than 40,000 people suffer an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest, with less than one in ten surviving.
Every minute without CPR and defibrillation reduces the chance of surviving an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest by up to 10%, whereas immediate CPR can more than double the chances of survival.
Darren said: “I like to ask people to look around them and think what they would do if they encountered something like what Callum went through. If not, it takes just 15 minutes to learn, and it could save someone’s life.”
So far, 520,000 people have stepped up to start learning CPR as part of the initative.
Sam Kennard, community resuscitation manager at the British Heart Foundation, said: “It’s incredibly moving to see these four supporters honoured at Wembley during the 40th Sky Bet EFL Play-Off Final.
"They are a powerful reminder of exactly why every minute matters.
"A cardiac arrest can happen to anyone, anywhere, at any time, and the difference between life and death is often whether someone nearby has the knowledge and confidence to step in and start CPR.
“We hope their stories will inspire even more people across the country to learn this lifesaving skill.
"It takes just 15 minutes – the length of half-time – to learn CPR with RevivR.
"That’s why we’re urging everyone to get involved today and learn CPR, so more lives can be saved when it matters most.”
Speaking about how it feels to return to Wembley one year after his cardiac arrest, Callum said: “It feels nice. It feels like a full circle moment.
"To turn something like what happened to me into something good – it’s the close of a chapter.”
For more information and to learn how to do CPR, see https://revivr.bhf.org.uk/.