Plumb Center welcomes NICE guidelines on cold homes

ROYAL LEAMINGTON SPA, U.K. - March 10, 2015 - PRLog -- “We are pleased to see that NICE has taken the lead in creating guidelines to address this crucial problem. It is important to agree on a nationwide approach to addressing the health, wellbeing and productivity issues that often result from people living in inadequately heated homes.

“NICE has taken an holistic approach to the guidelines: encouraging not only health and social care practitioners to act when they deal with patients or clients whose home heating might be impacting adversely on their lives, but also encouraging the emergency services, charities, housing association and local authority staff to refer vulnerable residents to a central referral service in each area.

“It has recognised the role that industry, particularly heating engineers and installers should play in educating the public on energy efficiency measures for their homes, including how to access government funding schemes such as the Energy Company Obligation and Green Deal Home Improvement Fund.

“Trusted professionals like plumbers and heating engineers should be the first port of call for the public for information on heating, insulation and ventilation that will help them improve the energy efficiency of their homes, and potentially reduce the likelihood of impaired health and reduce the average annual number of excess winter deaths, which currently stands at 24,000 for England and Wales.”

According to details released in the guidelines, most excess winter deaths and illnesses are not caused by hypothermia or extremes of cold. Rather, they are usually caused by respiratory and cardiovascular problems during normal winter temperatures. The risk of death and illness increases as the temperature falls further. Unlike illnesses and deaths associated with hot days (when the increase in the number of deaths last for a day or so after the heatwave) rates remain higher for up to two weeks after a cold spell has ended.

Housing conditions are a very important factor. According to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, the death rate rises about 2.8% for every degree Celsius drop in the external temperature for those in the coldest 10% of homes. This compares with a 0.9% rise in deaths for every degree Celsius drop in the warmest 10% of homes.

There are many barriers to addressing cold homes. These include a lack of awareness of the health issues, lack of local or national support (often linked to knowledge of what is available) and practical issues.