Safety First - Carbon Monoxide: Are You Safe?

This is the first of two part series by our Associate Editor, Tania Cowling

As children and adults spend more time indoors, caregivers must be aware of carbon monoxide (CO), a silent killer. Colorless, odorless and tasteless, CO can be extremely difficult to detect.
It is produced when a fuel containing carbon (gas, wood, oil, charcoal, kerosene and coal) is incompletely burned. Common household appliances that use gas, such as furnaces, refrigerators, clothes dryers, ranges, water heaters, fireplaces, charcoal grills, and wood burning stoves can produce CO if there are malfunctions and/or not enough air exchange.
If a building is vented properly, CO will most likely be safely vented to the outside; however, in today’s “energy efficient” dwellings, this may not be the case. These tightly-sealed homes or buildings are havens to trap CO polluted air inside year-round with no place to escape.

Why is CO dangerous?
Since you cannot see, smell, or taste it, CO can make you sick before you know it is there. For children, the risk of carbon monoxide poisoning increases dramatically each year. Carbon monoxide deprives the body’s tissues of oxygen. The symptoms of CO poisoning often mimic the flu; mild symptoms may include headache, dizziness, fatigue, nausea, and diarrhea.
As exposure increases, symptoms become more severe and may include confusion, shortness of breath, fast heart rate, convulsions, and unconsciousness. CO exposure can lead to brain damage or death.
CO is particularly dangerous for children. CO is heavier than air, so when present it tends to collect on or near the floor--at the children’s level. Caregivers should pay attention to sudden changes in a child’s behavior, such as sudden lethargy, sleepiness, or irrational behavior.

What To Do
If you suspect CO exposure or if you have a carbon monoxide detector that alerts you to the presence of high levels, get everyone out of the building immediately. Since CO can affect your mental processing, open doors and windows to reduce CO exposure while getting children out. Turn off any combustion appliance immediately, if possible, to avoid explosion.
Call 911 or your local emergency services from a cell phone or neighbor’s phone. Do not go back into the building until the emergency response personnel tell you it is okay to do so.

Tania Cowling is the Associate editor of ETLC Online, an author of early childhood teacher resource books, freelance writer and former ECE teacher.
**Reprinted With Permission—Healthy Child Care Magazine
http://www.healthychild.net