Mrs. Malik was 71 when she learned how to recognise the signs and symptoms of a stroke. She learned this from a series of pictures on a local hospital’s information leaflet. On the top banner, in blazing red ink, was the hospital’s emergency number that could be called if one were convinced that they were having a stroke. “Don’t hesitate,” it said. “Just call. We’ll be there in 10 minutes.”

Mrs. Malik carefully folded the paper till it showed just the emergency number and taped this to the landline phone set she used. She further wrote the number down in her personal phone diary, and made a mental note to ask someone to save the number in her cell phone.

Two days later, the ambulance was at her doorstep.

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