And, in place of generators - which can be difficult and dangerous to use - they call for the adoption of battery storage that automatically kicks in when the lights go out.
Along with highlighting the need to update and weatherize the existing power grid, they suggest a range of public health strategies, including routine text alerts warning vulnerable individuals that power might be disrupted. They propose more research and data collection to better identify how many Americans face this risk, as well as to document the medical complications and deaths that result. "We have climate change coming, which is going to throw at us more of these curve balls, more of these unexpected events that can impact the infrastructure," says Joan Casey, an environmental epidemiologist at Columbia University who has studied the health impact of power outages.Ĭasey is among a cadre of researchers, environmentalists and physicians who are trying to draw attention to the growing threat of power outages for people with medical devices. "Thinking that you've had your once-in-a-100-year storm - that's not a reality anymore," she says. While it's difficult to attribute a single weather event like the Texas Arctic blast to climate change, these crises have become more frequent in recent years as the planet warms, highlighting the need to protect such vulnerable individuals, says Sue Anne Bell, an assistant professor at the University of Michigan who studies the health effects of disasters. Some experts warn that complex home-based medical care is on a collision course with climate change, as severe weather events become more frequent nationwide. Near Houston, a 75-year-old man froze to death in his truck his family believes he ventured out to get a spare oxygen tank from the vehicle after losing electricity at his home. A San Antonio emergency room doctor, Ralph Riviello, tells Undark that around 18 to 24 people showed up at his hospital during the crisis, desperate to recharge medical equipment. 17 involving patients with life-sustaining medical devices and no power. The ambulance provider MedStar, which serves the greater Fort Worth area, fielded more than 50 calls - including Dorothy's - from Feb.
"He would die within minutes."Īcross Texas, other families were facing similar dilemmas. "I couldn't wait 'til the last minute," she says. Dorothy kept one eye on the clock, unsure how much longer her son's backup battery would hold out. David, who has muscular dystrophy, remained in bed beneath a pile of blankets.
The temperature inside had dropped to the low 50s. By nightfall, the one-story house had gone around 12 hours without power, other than an hour or so when the lights briefly turned on, recalled David's 89-year-old mother, Dorothy Taylor.
A family member brought over a generator and spent several hours trying, unsuccessfully, to get it working in the sub-freezing air. The next morning, the electricity flickered out in the Fort Worth home that the 65-year-old shares with his mother.ĭavid's ventilator switched over at some point to a backup battery and kept running. 14, an Arctic blast began to overwhelm the Texas power grid. During the power outages across Texas in February, he had to be transported to a hospital before his ventilator's backup battery ran out.įor four decades, David Taylor has relied on a ventilator to breathe, the whoosh, whoosh of the machine part of the background metronome of daily life. David Taylor, who has muscular dystrophy, relies on a ventilator to live.