A quick-thinking St Neots schoolboy saved the life of his little sister after she swallowed a 10p coin and started to choke.

Carnell Warfame, aged eight, stayed calm and called for help when he saw four-year-old Aaliyah put the coin in her mouth and start choking. The drama unfolded on Boxing Day afternoon as the two children were playing in the living room and mum Louisa, a community support worker, was about to leave the house, in Duloe Road, Eaton Ford, to start her shift.

“I was literally standing at the front door with my shoes on and about to leave when Carnell came running from the room and said Aaliyah was choking and that she had put some money in her mouth.”

When the mother-of-four ran into the room, Aaliyah was struggling to breathe and had turned blue around her mouth, and although Louisa has worked in the care industry for 16 years and has basic first-aid knowledge, she says she froze to the spot.

“It was awful, the worst moment of my life. I panicked and my legs just went to jelly. I screamed for my husband, Mosay, who was upstairs, to help, and I did manage to tell him what to do. He hit Aaliyah on the back several times, which must have dislodged the coin, and after what seemed like a very long time she finally took a breath and was sick.”

Aaliyah then brought up some blood, so her parents took her to A&E at Hinchingbrooke Hospital for a check up and staff told Louisa that Carnell’s quick reactions had probably saved his sister’s life.

Louisa says that she and Mosay are really proud of Carnell, a pupil at Crosshall Junior School, who will celebrate his ninth birthday at the end of January,

“The scary thing is that I was running late and I keep thinking now that if I had left on time or Mosay had not got downstairs so quickly it could have been very different. Carnell was so calm and told me exactly what Aaliyah had done so we knew the coin was blocking her airway. He was amazing.”