Man poisoned by winter gas heating

(China Daily)
Updated: 2009-11-05 10:46

A 24-year-old migrant worker became the city's first fatality from heating-related carbon monoxide poisoning this winter on Tuesday.

The food vender passed out and died Tuesday afternoon while asleep with members of his family in rented accommodation in Xicheng district, downtown Beijing.

A police investigation found unburned coal pieces in the 10 sq m house. Officers suggested the man, surnamed Ma, had inhaled a lethal amount of carbon monoxide due to the close proximity of his bed to the stove.

The man's 17-year-old brother and their 44-year-old father were still unconscious yesterday at the intensive care unit of nearby Fuxing Hospital.

Neighbors said the family rented the house, located at Dongguanying Hutong, in October after arriving from west China's Gansu province. The family survived by selling pancakes.

Police were still trying to contact the owner of the house yesterday.

This is Beijing's third gas poisoning accident from heating this winter, which started officially on Tuesday. A family of three was also rushed to hospital after burning coal for heating on Sunday.

Authorities from Xicheng district, where the Ma family lived, recently announced they would complete heating upgrades for about 66,000 households and 200,000 residents by next week.

But unlike most Beijingers who receive public heating, many residents in that region are forced to burn coal in houses that lack sufficient ventilation.

The government said yesterday it had sent police in communities to warn residents about the dangers of burning coal. And a coal safety campaign will begin on Saturday in all local communities, the government's special commission on heating said.

Gas poisoning killed 23 people in 337 cases last winter, official numbers show. The number remained steady over recent years despite efforts to upgrade heating systems in less equipped communities.

Inhabitants of old brick houses without heating systems were most vulnerable to gas poisoning, the commission said yesterday.