Again, of course there are cases for which knowing CPR or other training makes a difference - an obvious one is having basic first aid training around pools, pa

Again, of course there are cases for which knowing CPR or other training makes a difference - an obvious one is having basic first aid training around pools, particularly in the case of diving accidents leading to spinal injuries. Knowing the proper procedure to stabilize the person until paramedics can arrive on the scene does a lot to lessen the chance of secondary damage (eg, from the being moved wrong while trying to keep them from drowning). I don't think that anyone is arguing that having more people know CPR or first aid is bad, but rather, the number of cases cited were too small to even infer that kind of information from: it's quite possible that there's nothing that could have been done for many of the cases the paramedics were late to respond without actual medical equipment onsite, ie, having more than just bystanders who know CPR or basic first aid. The gap in size between the cited number of cases and the number of cases that happen is too great, especially considering that the cited number of cases were from a biased selection, eg, only cases that matched a particular profile. It's important that we not let emotion or our desire to do something about tragedies cloud our vision of what's actually helpful and what things actually matter. I would expect for every case cited to me where someone saved a life being a bystander, I could find one where bystanders with basic training and good intentions ended up making the situation worse. That is, of course, beside the point, because both collections of anecdotes would be just that, and not actual data about what's a good idea.