NEW YORK, Aug 19 (Reuters Health) -- Campers beware -- as temperatures drop at night, bringing a charcoal fire or propane gas stove inside to warm up a tent could cause potentially life-threatening carbon monoxide poisoning.
Six people, including four children, died in Georgia in two separate incidents involving the use of such heat sources inside a tent, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta.
"To avoid hazardous carbon monoxide exposures, fuel-burning equipment such as camping stoves, camping heaters, lanterns and charcoal grills should never be used inside a tent, camper or other enclosed shelter," according to a CDC report issued Thursday. "Opening tent flaps, doors, or windows is insufficient to prevent build-up of carbon monoxide concentrations from these devices."
Carbon monoxide is a colorless, odorless gas that is released during the incomplete combustion of fossil fuels. Anywhere from 878 to 1,513 deaths due to accidental carbon monoxide poisoning occurred every year in the US between 1979 and 1988, and most people associate poisonings with a build-up of the gas in homes or cars.
However, an estimated 30 campers died in the US every year between 1990 and 1994 from poisonings in tents or campers. Carbon monoxide is 200 to 250 times more efficient than oxygen at binding to hemoglobin, the blood molecule that ferries oxygen throughout the body. But carbon monoxide bound to hemoglobin robs it of its ability to carry oxygen, resulting in tissue hypoxia, or oxygen starvation.
The symptoms of carbon monoxide poisoning include headache, dizziness and nausea, but campers trying to ward off the cold at night may never arouse sufficiently from sleep to be alert to the signs, according to the report.
"Camping stoves and heaters are not designed to be used indoors and can emit hazardous amounts of carbon monoxide, and smoldering charcoal emits large amounts of carbon monoxide," according to the CDC. "Inside a tent or camper, these sources produce dangerous concentrations of carbon monoxide, which becomes even more dangerous to sleeping persons who are unable to recognize the early symptoms of carbon monoxide poisoning."
SOURCE: Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report 1999;48:705-706.
