As winter sets in and temperature drops, people start experiencing a cold weather coupled with foggy atmosphere especially in the northwest region of the country. The number of patients especially children and elderly people with cold-related diseases has increased across the country recently. Various cold-related diseases like common cold, influenza, bronchiolitis, pneumonia, tonsillitis, sore throat, asthma, earache, whooping cough and viral diarrhoea are infecting the people mostly children and elderly ones. Many of them were admitted to their respective districts health complexes and general hospitals in the last three days, according to media report. If a member of the family has fever, other members are also getting infected and falling sick.
All the patients, who are visiting the hospitals and clinics, are suffering from various seasonal diseases like fever, cough and throat pain. Therefore, it is difficult for the patients to know whether they are infected with common flu caused by winter or dengue without test. Physicians advised people not to get panicked, requesting them to go to hospitals and clinics to conduct test for diagnose the diseases.
The health ministry should
take necessary measures to
make people conscious about
cold-related diseases
With the advent of winter, we must all remain cautious about cold-related disease. We must pay heed to experts’ health guidelines. Apart from the cold weather, the dust pollution also causes serious diseases including heart, chronic respiratory diseases, lung infections and even cancer during the winter.
The health ministry should issue instructions to government hospitals, health complexes and all other organisations at the field-level to make people conscious about cold-related diseases and provide treatment properly.
All districts and upazilas administration should distribute warm clothes among the distressed people to mitigate their sufferings in advance. Apart from the government, the well off sections of the society and different socio- economic organisations of the country will also have to stand beside the cold affected people with the mentality to distribute warm clothes to them as part of social responsibility.