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Tony Neeley, a homeless personof Chicago he told the newspaper The New York Times This week, I had "cold and scared".
And this is not for less.
According to the US Meteorological Service, the western city of Central America could endure this week temperatures near -30ºC.
Several degrees less than what is usually recorded in certain areas of the Antarctic or Mount Everest.
With Illinois (where Chicago is)The states of Michigan and Wisconsin have declared themselves in an emergency situation because of a polar vortex that has lowered the temperature to unexpected levels.
- In Chicago, "it will be colder than on Everest and Antarctica": the historic cold wave that affects the United States. because of the polar vortex
After all, they are cold and the human body is not prepared.
The majority of the planet's population lives in areas with temperate and tropical climates, where the thermometer does not usually go down to these numbers.
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And although we have managed to survive in inhospitable areas (like Siberia or Greenland), the truth is that humanity has sought to get out of the cold to survive.
But what are the effects of extreme cold on the body that makes survival so difficult?
Agency response
The human body has several defense mechanisms to try to increase our temperature when it is cold.
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Our muscles are shaking and our teeth are chattering. The hairs are bristling and the skin becomes "chicken", in a kind of evolutionary echo of the time when our ancestors were covered with hair.
The hypothalamus, the brain gland that acts as the body's thermostat, stimulates these reactions so that the vital organs continue to function, at least until we find some heat and shelter.
The hypothalamus' mission is to keep the heat at all costs, even if it means sacrificing extremities.
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That's why we feel tingling in the fingers and toes when it's very cold. The body keeps its warm blood close to the center, limiting the supply of blood to the arms and legs.
In case of extreme cold, and especially if the skin is exposed, this effect can cause cases of freezing, that is to say that the blood flow is reduced and that the lack of blood circulation can cause that tissues freeze and break.
What to do to protect yourself from the cold?
The main recommendation of the experts is to avoid going outside during the cold days.
If, due to particular circumstances, it is necessary to leave, it is advisable to cover with several layers of layers in order to control the production of heat of the human body and to avoid the direct contact of the cold with the skin.
They also advise to avoid at all costs that the clothes are wet, because they could easily freeze and endanger the health of the person.
For this reason, for example, the authorities of the state of Iowa have asked people to "Avoid deep breathing and minimize conversations" if you go out.
He also recommends the use of specialized glbades to cover the eyes.
Another tip is to avoid wearing rings or jewelry at all costs. "The temperature of the metal drops very fast, much faster than the temperature of the skin," John Stone, a Canadian expert on cold survival, told the BBC.
Heart attack
Beyond the fact that the human body does not support these extreme temperatures, cold can have disastrous consequences for health.
Studies in the UK have shown that for each degree of temperature drop below 18 ° C, the number of climate-related deaths increases by 1.5%.
And it has nothing to do with the flu or colds that get complicated, but with heart attacks and strokes.
One of the effects of cold is that the blood vessels of the skin contract to retain heat, the blood composition changes and the heart has to work harder to pump blood through de contracted vessels.
As the numbers show, the people most affected by extreme cold are the elderly and those with compromised immune systems.
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"One of the effects of aging is that your body is less able to regulate temperature, which makes it less able to judge whether it's cold or hot," said Andrew Harrop, of Age Concern, at the BBC.
The disadvantaged humans
Animals that live in polar areas are protected because they are covered with a hair that traps warm air close to the body or because they contain a lot of fat, sometimes several centimeters d & # 39; thickness.
The fat does not transfer heat very well, so he keeps it inside the body.
Humans, bare-skinned and relatively low fat, are simply not designed for these environments.
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But we have learned to imitate these qualities. Scientists at Antarctic stations, for example, dress several layers to trap warm air close to the body, just as does the fur of animals.
Extremely low temperatures can also create problems with the infrastructure on which humans depend.
Intense cold can destroy power lines due to the weight of ice and snow, causing power outages, and uninsulated pipes can freeze and explode.
For cars, the freezing point of gasoline is close to -76ºC but that of the oil is at -40 ºC.
And other lubricants can be put thicker at not so low temperatures. Diesel is normally stuck at -10 ° C if it does not contain special additives allowing it to remain viscous in a cold environment.
Ice history
Some lessons in history warn of the terrible effects of extreme cold, such as the invasion of Russia by Germany in 1941.
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When Adolf Hitler ordered the invasion, early in the winter in the northern hemisphere, temperatures fell to levels similar to those observed in recent winters in North America.
Thousands of soldiers died frozen while they were wearing summer uniforms for a supposed short campaign.
The engines of trucks and tanks could be de-iced only by lighting fires under vehicles.
The guns did not fire because the fat had melted and, on leaving the fire, the boiling water froze in a little more than a minute.
The Italian journalist Curzio Malaparte recalled in his novel Kaputt how the Eastern Front veterans who landed in occupied Warsaw arrived frozen eyelids in extreme cold.
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