Around 6,500 homes burn each year in Romania
Approximately 6,500 house fires occur annually in Romania, and over the last decade, around 2,000 people lost their lives in house fires. More than 100 of them were children.
Over 65,000 house fires occurred from January 2012 to December 2021, 7,000 of them only over the last year. Defective or unclean chimneys, as well as faulty or improvised electrical installations, continue to be the main cause of fires in Romania, according to official figures cited by Digi24.
Most of the fires take place over the cold season, when low temperatures set in and force people to make fires to stay warm. Children and the elderly are the main victims in the ensuing house fires.
The main causes of fires in the last ten years are defective or unclean chimneys (31%), defective or improvised electrical installations (23%), and defective, improvised, or unsupervised means of heating (12%), according to the Romanian General Inspectorate for Emergency Situations (IGSU).
Gas leaks represented another cause of emergency situations, with 800 such incidents recorded at the national level in the last decade. Over 200 people were injured and 40 died because of gas leaks.
64% of respondents in an IRES survey commissioned by the IGSU believe that the permanent supervision of children is the most important thing for ensuring their safety in the house or household. One in four respondents nevertheless admits that they leave their children under 10 years old unattended at home.
106 children lost their lives as a result of house fires between January 2012 and December 2021. Children cannot appreciate the dangers around them and lack the power to save themselves from the fire.
The situation, however, shows improvement. In 2013, a peak of 20 child deaths in house fires were recorded, after which a downward trend followed, reaching a low of 5 in 2021, according to IGSU data. Of the total number of those who lost their lives, approximately 63% came from rural areas, and 37% from urban areas.
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