Winter Health Tips: When, how, and for how long should you use a fireplace or heater to avoid choking? Learn from your doctor's advice.

News Topical, Digital Desk : With the onset of winter, people resort to various measures to keep themselves warm. While warm clothing is used to keep the body warm, heaters, blowers, or fireplaces are used to raise the room temperature. While this certainly makes the room warmer than the cold outside, this method can sometimes be life-threatening.

Burning a fire or blower in a closed room can cause suffocation.

Every winter, such incidents occur where people die from suffocation while sleeping. Similar incidents were reported last year, while several people have lost their lives in January and September of this year as well. Speaking to the ABP Live team, Dr. Aman, a senior physician at Maggo Hospital, one of the major hospitals in West Delhi, explained that when a fireplace or any other burning object is lit in a closed room, it rapidly depletes the oxygen in the room. Due to the lack of fresh air, the oxygen level steadily decreases, and during this time, carbon monoxide released from the fire enters the body through the breath, which is extremely fatal.

Why does carbon monoxide cause deep coma?

When carbon monoxide enters the body, it binds to hemoglobin. This creates carboxyhemoglobin, which, when its concentration increases, causes the person to fall into a deep sleep. This state is like a deep coma, and sometimes the person never wakes up—they die in their sleep. 

How to avoid this danger? Keep these important things in mind.

• Do not keep the room where you are lighting a bonfire or fireplace completely closed and always keep a bucket of water.
• If there are many people sleeping in the room, then make sure to extinguish the fire before sleeping.
• Burning a fireplace reduces the oxygen in the room – don't make it a habit.
• If you experience symptoms like chest pain due to burning a stove or heater daily in a closed room, then be careful immediately.
• While running the heater or blower, open the room for some time to let air come in.
• Do not keep flammable objects near the heater.
• Be sure to turn off the heater before sleeping, this is important to save life.
• Keep a vessel of water in the room so that the air does not become dry.
• If you are forced to use a heater or blower, keep drinking lukewarm water, soup or tea.
• Keep using moisturizer to protect your skin from dryness.

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