|
|
France feels the Heat
Gay Paree -- Morgues and funeral homes in France are overrun with bodies as the country struggles to cope with an estimated 3,000 people who died of heat-related causes in the past two weeks. Government officials, including Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin and Health Minister Jean-Francois Mattei, held an emergency meeting Thursday to discuss ways of dealing with what Mattei has described as a "veritable epidemic" of deaths. A "Plan Blanc" or "White Plan" has been put into action, with doctors and nurses being recalled from leave, some morgue workers called out of retirement, and further 1,000 hospital beds being made available from Friday. The head of the doctorsâ emergency association, Patrick Pelloux told The Associated Press that some hospitals requisitioned kitchen refrigerators to hold the dead, while others put up tents to keep corpses before burial.
| "Put him next to the potato salad, Jean-Pierre..." |
A morgue in Longjumeau, a suburb south of Paris, rented an air-conditioned tent to house twice as many corpses. General Funeral Services, Franceâs largest undertaker, said it handled some 3,230 deaths from August 6 to 12, compared to 2,300 on an average week — a 37 percent jump.
| "It's like the Albigensians were back or something!" |
Family members of victims lashed out at the government.
| "Grandmaw's dead and it's all your fault!" |
Martine Flouâs 70-year-old motherâs body had to be brought to a morgue in Paris from their home 50 miles away because there was no space there. "Itâs scandalous. The government has done nothing," she told AP.
Some officials said one problem is that the country all but shuts down in August, when many French go on vacation. Hospital services in cities are curtailed and many families leave their elderly relatives at home. A law limiting Franceâs work week to 35 hours left medical centers and retirement homes doubly short-staffed. Germany and Italy have not issued figures on heat-related deaths, saying such figures are difficult to come by because heat may be just one factor contributing to a personâs death.
| They'll be released when everybody's back from vacation... |
Doctors said typically about 30 people a day die in the Paris area. This year, that number has climbed to more than 180 a day. If the preliminary French figures hold up, the heat-related death toll would be among the highest in recent years, officials at the World Health Organization in Geneva said. About 2,600 heat-related deaths were recorded in India five years ago, and roughly 500 people died from heat-related causes in 1995 in Chicago, according to WHO experts.
| Keeling over everywhere you look... |
This yearâs heat wave is Franceâs worst ever on record, said Patrick Galois, a forecaster for national weather service Meteo France. Meteo France said the worst of the heat wave was probably over, with no part of the country reporting temperatures above 35 Celsius (95 Fahrenheit) on Thursday. Between August 3 and August 13, temperatures regularly exceeded 40 C (104 F), TF1 reported. Typically, the temperature in August in Paris is around 23 C (75 F).
The French Health Minister is pretending to be above the fray - claiming that his Ministry has done everything right. Uh, yeah, right. Heâs toast. Since people are dying, thatâs as close to being a smartass as Iâll go on this one. Itâs sad and amazing to a guy who grew up popping asphalt bubbles, barefooted, in the Texas heat - which was a lot higher than these temperatures.
Posted by: .com 2003-08-15 |
| http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=17654 |
|