Be careful with the stove and fireplace!
section 11
community topics
63 meeting
Let’s review:
Once the meeting starts, welcome everyone and ask the participants: • Who can help us remember what we talked about in our last meeting? • Who was able to do the activity at home that we asked you to do at the end of the meeting? How did it go? • Does anyone have questions or concerns after doing the activity?
What are we going to learn? We are going to learn how to be careful around the stove and fire in the kitchen in order to avoid acute respiratory illness in children.
LET’S TALK ABOUT IT! We are going to look at some pictures, so we can talk about what we all know about this topic.
What are the stoves and fireplaces in the community like? Do you think they should be improved? How? What are some of the advantages of having an improved stove and fireplace? In what ways can you improve the stove or fireplace that you have?
section 11 / community topics • meeting 63
46
Activity:
“The safe stove” We are going to think about different ways to improve the stove (or fireplace) to make it safer for young children.
What we’ll need: • Flipchart with the “basic care with a stove” (see below”)
WHAT WE’LL DO: Start by asking how many people have a woodstove to cook with. Of those who raised their hand form one or two groups, depending on the number of participants, ask those who have another type of stove to form another group. (It would be helpful t mention how many people per group you’re shooting for) • Ask the group that uses a woodstove to discuss the ways to improve their stove in order to avoid accidents and cause less respiratory sicknesses due to excessive smoke. • The group with the other type of stove should discuss ways to avoid accidents with the stove while cooking. • Each group should share their ideas and think of things to do on a community level and discuss, how they can provide the materials, labor, technical assistance, and other ideas to help make the necessary improvements. Other Suggestions: Plan a visit with the group to a home that uses an improved woodstove and have the owners explain the process for installation, the benefits and the ways that they still have to be careful. • Share with the group these basic ways that the whole family can be more careful when there is a young child in the house:
BEING CAREFUL WITH THE STOVE OR WOODSTOVE: • Never allow children to be near the stove • Never cook while holding a baby • Never let hot water fall on the floor close to where the child is • Never ask your young child to bring things from the stove • Be very careful when a flame sparks. Pay attention to make sure there is not a child close by that the spark could land on.
Facilitator’s Manual
47
Summing Up:
What did we learn today? Now, we’ll review what we discussed today. • How do you feel after this meeting? Why? • What are the two most important things you’ve learned today? • What will you do differently based on what you learned during the meeting? • What did you like the most? Are there things you didn’t like? • Do you have any remaining concerns or questions about what we talked about? To finish, what would you recommend to improve today’s meeting when we do it again with another group. (Explain that answering this question will help the meeting be even better in the future for parents with small children.)
To do at home:
Tell parents to review the state of their stove or woodstove and to look for ways to make necessary changes.
Basic information for the facilitator: Learning more about being careful with the stove and fireplace: Respiratory infections are the leading cause of death around the world of children under five years of age. • Nearly half of all children who die before age six, die of either: • Acute upper respiratory infections (sinus congestion, nose congestion, infection of or inflammation of the throat or tonsils, or ear infections) • Lower respiratory infections (infections of the trachea, bronchial tubes, and lungs) which are even more dangerous • Nearly 2 million children under five years of age die every year in developing countries from acute lower respiratory infections. Respiratory infections in children increase significantly when they are exposed regularly to wood and charcoal smoke. • Wood and charcoal smoke aggravates asthma, emphysema, pneumonia, and bronchitis in young children. It irritates the eyes and triggers headaches and allergies. The particles in wood and charcoal smoke are too small to be filtered by the nose and upper respiratory systems of children, so they wind up deep in their lungs. They can remain there for many months causing structural damage and chemical changes. Wood and charcoal smoke also interferes with normal lung development in infants and young children.
section 11 / community topics • meeting 63
48 • Many millions of households around the world cook with open indoor stoves that are not well vented. These stoves cause significant indoor air pollution that is especially bad for the health of any young children in that household. • The good news is that none of these households needs to live with this indoor air pollution. Families can solve the problem by using one of the many varieties of vented, energy-efficient indoor stoves. These stoves burn much less firewood and charcoal and conduct the harmful smoke outside – not inside the household. By changing or improving their stoves, parents can improve the health and well-being of their small children. • The improved stove called ONIL that is used in many rural areas of Guatemala, uses 70% less firewood and almost completely eliminates indoor smoke from cooking fires. It can be mass produced and easily installed. • Here’s an example of a community that changed its children’s health: In 2002, only 5% of the population in the community used the improved ONIL stove. By 2006, nearly all of the households in the community used the improved stove. Health records from the local clinic in the community show that during this period of time, cases of acute upper respiratory infection in children 1 to 4 years of age went down by 20%, and cases of acute lower respiratory infections in children 1 to 4 years of age decreased by 44%. This is a very important example that shows that by improving their stoves, parents can improve the health of their small children.
Facilitator’s Manual