Half of England and Wales lives outside recommended defibrillator reach

Research by the British Heart Foundation's Heart Restart campaign, reported by The Guardian on July 22, 2026, finds that 35 million people in England and Wales — over half the population — live outside the recommended three- to five-minute brisk-walk radius of a 24/7 defibrillator. Over 16 million face a round trip exceeding 1km. Early defibrillation can more than double cardiac-arrest survival odds, making the geographic gap a measure of clinical risk.