I read an account of a bear attack a while ago that I found somewhat a disturbing. A young woman camping in a wilderness area of a park in Colorado had been pulled out of her sleeping bag in the middle of the night by a large grizzly and dragged away screaming while a friend of hers nearby, who was also attacked, fled for help.
Help was found and a group of people set out to find the girl, if they could, and scare away the bear, if they could. The bear did wander off leaving the badly injured girl lying on the ground. The bear had ripped all of her clothing off and inflicted several life-threatening wounds.
I read the accounts given by some of the rescuers and could not find any reference to any attempt to stop the bleeding, staunch the wounds, apply a tourniquet, or any other first aid. When recounting the story later, what they all agreed on was that someone immediately covered her up with a coat. Others returned to a nearby lodge to find equipment with which to carry her up to the lodge. After considerable time, she was brought to the lodge and a doctor there treated her wounds but it was too late and she died.
It appeared to me that the rescuers were more concerned with the propriety of looking at a young woman’s naked body than they were with saving her life. Nobody involved describes even examining her carefully to determine where the wounds were, let alone attempting to stop the bleeding. It is by no means certain but it seems possible that her life could have been saved if someone had made a serious attempt to staunch the most critical wounds.
It is quite possible that she would have died anyway.
It shouldn’t surprise anyone. Here’s an account of a man in Japan who admirably attempted to save the life of a woman by applying a defibrillator (an AED or Automated External Defibrillator) only to be labelled a pervert by a bystander. Now, I personally have wondered for years about how an AED is used– does the skin have to be bare? A surprising number of people don’t know. According to the information I found, it must be applied to bare skin, on the chest.
So if, I came across a woman suffering from a serious heart ailment and attempted to apply an AED, would someone watching would be outraged and demand that we all let her die rather than see her naked breasts?
I learned that the AED kit comes with a scissors, and yes, you absolutely should remove any clothing over the chest area, especially the bra (which may have an underwire in it).
And good luck with that. I know exactly what you will encounter. You will encounter some asshole who thinks he’s a god-almighty guardian of public safety and good order and he will forcefully demand that you wait for a nice respectable ambulance to come along and handle the emergency.
I am quite confident that people have died because of people’s delicate sense of decency and that you will never hear about it.