Protect People From Cold

The season of winter has brought with it frosty mornings and chilly days. Minimum temperatures across the country is in free fall, with Kathmandu recording 2.C on Saturday morning, lowest this season so far. Provinces with mountainous region are experiencing snowfall. Amid the deepening cold, traffic of vehicles on major roads has started thinning in the early morning and soon after nightfall. This steep drop in temperature has prompted many to prolong their time indoors. Many are seen huddling around a fire started impromptu in the open in an attempt to beat the biting cold. Those privileged with modern amenities are increasingly staying indoor and working from air-conditioned settings or surrounding themselves with heat radiating equipment. They are also enjoying foods and drinks that raise the body temperature.  

But the vast majority of the people – many of whom include daily wage labourers, those running shops in the open, and whose duty requires them to expose themselves to the cold, among others – don't have that luxury. They have no option but to go about their lives.  Especially hit hard among them are the poor people for whom staying safe and warm can be a real challenge. This is also the time when numbing cold collides with spiking air pollution. Basic science explains this. Cold air, being heavy, unlike lighter dry air, stays near the ground level rather than moving upward, absorbing pollutants from vehicular emissions and plumes of smoke released into the atmosphere from waste and wood burning in the open. Deteriorating air quality to severe level due to this phenomena has already been a pressing issue in urban areas for quite a while now. 

To address this issue and minimise air pollution, the Kathmandu Metropolitan City (KMC) is said to have initiated efforts to generate awareness at the local level, encouraging communities to refrain from making fire in the open. To make its campaign effective, the KMC has even decided to fine individuals caught engaging in open burning Rs. 10,000. Metropolitan police will be mobilised across the city to keep an eye on such an activity. The City is also proving training to sweepers and landfill site workers to ensure better practices to keep air pollution in check.    

While these measures are commendable, efforts must also be made to keep poor people – who include vulnerable ones like newborns, the elderly, expectant and new mothers, and those with compromised immune system – safe from cold. One way to do this is to make sure that they have adequate warm clothes to drive away the cold. Prolonged exposure to cold can well result in a serious, life-threatening health problem. When exposed to cold temperatures for a longer period, human body loses more heat than it is able to produce, eventually exhausting stored energy in our body and resulting in a lower-than-normal core body temperature. This condition, doctors warn, can cause a heart attack, liver damage, kidney failure, or even death if left untreated.

Winter is a time when everyone needs to be extra cautious. Many people have lost their lives owing to fatal mishaps in heating equipment or due to suffocation as a result of toxic gases released from materials burned for heat in an unventilated or poorly ventilated room. Awareness campaigns to prevent such losses must be made effective. Banning or regulating the sale and distribution of such materials and other fire hazards is also equally important.