Snowy Owl
Retired in 2010, In Memoriam
[FONT=Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif]Mumbaikars battle bouts of fever, cough
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Mumbaikars_battle_bouts_of_fever/rssarticleshow/2676432.cms
[/FONT][FONT=Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif]5 Jan 2008, 0609 hrs IST
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[/FONT][FONT=Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif] MUMBAI:
Mumbai is getting cool, but the crowds at doctors' clinics aren't. The queue has been growing as citizens battle bouts of fever, cough or viral pneumonitis (a la Sonia Gandhi) at a time when conditions ought to be regarded salubrious.
The weather could be termed bracing—some would say when the mercury hit the thirteens and fourteens this week—but what's alarming is the yawning difference between the minimum tempartures at night and the maximum temperatures during daytime. It may be a harbinger of the climate changes in the offing— and it is this very differential that is making Mumbaikars sicker, say experts.
"If on the night of January 2, Bandra and Santa Cruz registered 12.2 degree Celsius, the day-time temperatures were still over 30," points out Dr S R Kamat, chest physician who represented India at the first global convention on climate change in 1992. "When you go between high and low temperatures in a day, you are bound to suffer from a blocked nose, irritant cough or poor lung function," he says.
Yo-yoing weather, in fact, has been the pattern all through this winter. The first couple of weeks of November saw rising temperatures and high levels of humidity. Conditions turned pleasant from the latter half of the month until the third week of December when a distinct warming again took effect. It was the warmest Christmas in years before another shift set in to take the mercury to its lowest point in this season: 12.2 degrees on January 2.
It is such changes that cause viruses and micro-organisms to proliferate across Mumbai. In fact, many Mumbaikars have been landing up in the emergency departments of hospital due to respiratory ailments this winter. Chest physician Dr A Mahashur of Hinduja Hospital says more people are coming in with upper respiratory tract infections, persistent colds and coughs.[/FONT]
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Mumbaikars_battle_bouts_of_fever/rssarticleshow/2676432.cms
[/FONT][FONT=Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif]5 Jan 2008, 0609 hrs IST
[FONT=Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif]
[/FONT][FONT=Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif] MUMBAI:
Mumbai is getting cool, but the crowds at doctors' clinics aren't. The queue has been growing as citizens battle bouts of fever, cough or viral pneumonitis (a la Sonia Gandhi) at a time when conditions ought to be regarded salubrious.
The weather could be termed bracing—some would say when the mercury hit the thirteens and fourteens this week—but what's alarming is the yawning difference between the minimum tempartures at night and the maximum temperatures during daytime. It may be a harbinger of the climate changes in the offing— and it is this very differential that is making Mumbaikars sicker, say experts.
"If on the night of January 2, Bandra and Santa Cruz registered 12.2 degree Celsius, the day-time temperatures were still over 30," points out Dr S R Kamat, chest physician who represented India at the first global convention on climate change in 1992. "When you go between high and low temperatures in a day, you are bound to suffer from a blocked nose, irritant cough or poor lung function," he says.
Yo-yoing weather, in fact, has been the pattern all through this winter. The first couple of weeks of November saw rising temperatures and high levels of humidity. Conditions turned pleasant from the latter half of the month until the third week of December when a distinct warming again took effect. It was the warmest Christmas in years before another shift set in to take the mercury to its lowest point in this season: 12.2 degrees on January 2.
It is such changes that cause viruses and micro-organisms to proliferate across Mumbai. In fact, many Mumbaikars have been landing up in the emergency departments of hospital due to respiratory ailments this winter. Chest physician Dr A Mahashur of Hinduja Hospital says more people are coming in with upper respiratory tract infections, persistent colds and coughs.[/FONT]