Chapter 2: Sick? Get Help Fast

Lily: "Feeling bad? Don't wait. Tell a grown-up straight away!"

Rangers are not doctors. Our job is to notice, tell a grown-up fast and help gently. Dr. Hazel says the quickest helper is the one who speaks up.

What Rangers know

• Danger signs: go to a helper now. These signs in any child mean a grown-up takes them to a clinic straight away:
• breathing that is fast or hard work
• can't drink or keeps throwing up
• very sleepy or hard to wake
• a fit (shaking they can't stop)
• a high fever in a baby
• Tummy trouble. With runny poo, the body loses water. Sip safe water often, keep eating, and let a grown-up mix the special drink (ORS). Wash hands after the toilet.
• Sleep under the net. Where there are mosquitoes, sleep under a treated net every night, tucked in all round. Tell a grown-up about holes.
• Rash plus fever. Tell a grown-up, stay a little apart from babies, and let a health worker check.
• Cool a burn. Put the burn under cool, clean, running water for 20 minutes. No butter, oil, toothpaste or ice. Tell a grown-up.
• A small cut. Wash it with clean water, cover it with something clean, and tell a grown-up. Only a grown-up opens the first-aid kit.
• Too hot / too cold.
• Too hot: red face, headache, dizzy. Go to shade, sip water, tell.
• Too cold: shivering, slow words. Put on dry layers, get a blanket, tell.
• Calling for help. Know how to find a grown-up and say: who is hurt, where you are, and what happened.

• Medicine is a grown-up's job. Never take or give medicine yourself.

• Cholera and bad diarrhoea: go now. Lots and lots of watery poo (sometimes like rice water), sunken eyes, very thirsty or very weak: a grown-up takes them to the health tent straight away, giving sips of ORS on the way. Clean water, clean hands and latrines stop it spreading.

• Cough plus fast or hard breathing (the chest pulls in, a noisy breath) in a child or baby is a pneumonia danger sign: go to the clinic now. Keep babies warm.
• Vaccines. The clinic jabs and drops protect you from measles and other serious illnesses. When helpers call for vaccines, go with your grown-up. A little pinch, big protection.
• Dengue and mosquitoes. Mosquitoes that bite in the day breed in tiny pools of still water. With a grown-up, cover water containers, tip out water in old pots and tyres, and wear long sleeves. Fever with a bad headache, pain behind the eyes, a rash or bleeding gums: tell a grown-up and go to the clinic.
• Too hot signs are in Chapter 11.
• Learn your local help number with your grown-up, and where the nearest health tent is.

Ranger checklist

• ☐ I know lots of watery poo means go now.
• ☐ I know cough plus fast breathing means go now.
• ☐ I go for vaccines when helpers call.
• ☐ I help cover water and tip out puddles in pots, with a grown-up.
• ☐ I can name three danger signs.
• ☐ I tell a grown-up fast when someone feels very sick.
• ☐ I know the cool-water rule for burns (20 minutes).
• ☐ I can wash and cover a small cut, and then tell.
• ☐ I can say who, where and what when I ask for help.
• ☐ I sleep under the net, tucked in.
• ☐ I never touch medicine.

Earn your badge (Get Help Fast · First Aid; Badge_Matrix.csv)

Watch and learn

• Planned Health arc: Danger Signs: Go to the Clinic Now · Sleep Under the Net · Tummy Trouble · Helping With Baby · Hungry Signs and the Feeding Tent · Measles: Rash + Fever · Cool a Burn
• Planned First Aid arc: Wash a Small Cut · Call for Help · Too Hot / Too Cold (Dr. Hazel's kit)
• Produced: EP05 Wash Your Hands (#005)
• Go Bag #GB1: the contact card and safe pocket help helpers reach your family.

Fact-checked Oct 21, 2026, approved by David McKellips.