Red Cross Aids Frostbite Patients during Siberia's Coldest Winter

Written by Stephanie Kriner, Staff Writer, RedCross.org

A hospital in Irkutsk has been inudated with frostbite victims this winter.

Irkutsk oblast, Siberia, January 22, 2001 — Temperatures in Siberia had dropped lower than they had in years, and Nina Kuznietsova could not afford to buy firewood. Standing outside in the bone-chilling temperatures for 12 agonizing hours, Nina sold toys on the streets of the Siberian city of Irkutsk during the day. Despite being covered from head to toe in a fur coat, fur hat and boots, the savage weather took its toll. At night, still wearing her coat, she shivered under the covers.

"One night after I came home, I noticed that my feet felt strange, so I took off my boots. They were swollen and dark-colored," says Kuznietsova. When the elderly woman tried to stand up, she realized that she could not walk. She crawled through the snow to her neighbors' house to ask for help. "They called the ambulance," she says.

At the hospital, Kuznietsova learned that her feet had been severely frostbitten and both would have to be amputated. "I have a good doctor. He kept some of my left foot or else I couldn't walk at all," says Kuzinietsova, sitting sideways on cot draped with a mottled sheet. White bandages cover painful stumps on both legs.

Meteorologists are calling this winter Siberia's coldest on record, keeping the burn unit of the Irkutsk City Clinical Hospital, which treats both burn and frostbite patients, especially busy. Since January 1, 154 people have been treated for frostbite, and five have died. "We've seen the number of frostbite patients that we normally see over the entire winter in just two weeks," says Tatiana Rerke, deputy head director of the hospital.

Frostbite victims have lost feet hands to the bitter cold hitting Siberia this winter. They will receive antiquated prosthetics from the government.

The bitter cold also has caused more severe frostbite cases than usual, Rerke says. "We have seen some very bad cases. Sixty-five people have been hospitalized," she says. Most frostbite patients were homeless people or people who had consumed too much alcohol and passed out in the snowy street, Rerke says.

A cold wave, severe even by Siberia standards, swept through the "Sleeping Land" early this month, sending temperatures as low as minus 70 degrees Celsius (-94 Fahrenheit) in the Kemerovo region, some 1,800 miles east of Moscow. Throughout the rest of Siberia, temperatures plummeted to a still unbearable negative 40. The cold spell put a strain on Russia's power plants and heating stations, which are already prone to failure because of poor maintenance and slim fuel supplies. Temperatures have warmed into the negative 20s and 30s, but forecasters are calling for a return to the deadly weather next month.

The American Red Cross and Russian Red Cross came to the aid of the hospital, which was unable to feed the overwhelming number of frostbite patients arriving every day for two weeks straight. "The Red Cross helped us by allowing us to provide additional food to patients," Rerke says. "It's especially important for our frostbite patients, whose bodies have been weakened by the severe cold, to eat well-balanced meals in order to strengthen their protective forces."

Throughout eastern Siberia, where some of the coldest temperatures have been recorded, the American Red Cross is providing food to the most vulnerable. Frostbite patients received some 9 tons of food during the recent cold wave.