According to a report by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), more than 15,000 people go to hospital emergency rooms each year because of suspected CO poisoning. The Journal of the American Medical Association reports that approximately 2,000 people die each year from CO poisoning.
According to a statement from Kidde PLC, manufacturer of CO alarms, Chicago Fire Commissioner Cortez Trotter pointed to the success of the city's similar ordinance, passed in 1994 after the tragic death of an entire family. "While the Chicago Fire Department's responses to CO alarms have increased dramatically since the enactment of this law, our incidents of CO-related deaths have drastically decreased," Trotter noted. "Just as smoke detectors save lives, so do CO detectors."
Publication date: 04/04/2005