10-Year-Old Hero
When Kathy Machado, 9, choked on a piece of butterscotch candy while jumping rope during lunch hour at her school in Hughson, Calif., her breath was cut off. Teacher Ron Phillips reported that Maurice Brett, 10, suddenly reached around Kathy from behind and jerked her solar plexus sharply upward, forcing air upward from her lungs and dislodging the candy.
Maurice had learned the Hemlich method during a visit to the Hughson firehouse earlier in the school year. Luis Duron, the fire department engineer who taught the method, said “he definitely saved her life.
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