Posted on 07/12/2012 8:40:00 PM PDT by goldstategop
"We looked for high quality research that had compared groups of people using fans with groups who didn't use them during a heatwave [sic]. However, we didn't find any research that met our requirements," the researchers wrote. "Some suggested that fans might reduce health problems, while others suggested that the fans might make things worse."
The team of researchers concluded that a fan that is not directly aimed at a person in temperatures lower than 95 degrees Fahrenheit may help one cool down. However, they said that a fan propped against a window pumping in outside air above 95 degrees could be dangerous, and might actually cause a person's body temperature to increase, putting them at risk.
"This is particularly important for people who are considered more vulnerable to the effects of heat, such as older adults who are less able to cool down through sweating or increasing the flow of blood to their skin," Gupta said in a press release.
While cool air on sweat may feel refreshing, excess sweating can still lead to dehydration and other dangers such as heat exhaustion and heat stroke.
"I would advise caution in using fans for elderly patients during a heat wave with a history of coronary artery disease or hypertension who are on multiple medications which have the ability to impair effective sweating or cooling," added Dr. Robert Glatter, an emergency medicine physician at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, in an email to HealthPop. Glatter was not involved in the new research.
(Excerpt) Read more at cbsnews.com ...
We don’t really have cool nights during the summer here in New Orleans. The nights can be downright awful! During August especially, the nighttime temps can hover around the high 80s and 90. But running a big box fan in the window helped a lot during those hot summer nights before A/C.
When I was a teen, we had a reversible fan in my second floor, bedroom window. One evening after a very hot summer's day which had left my room temp in the nineties, I turned the fan on. My father insisted on having the fan set to sucking the air out of the house emphatically stating that it would cool off the room. I told him blowing cool air from outside would cool my room down faster. He was adamant that my idea was wrong and his idea (suck the hot air out) was a better idea.
After one hour of sucking hot house air out the window, my room was still roasting hot. Meanwhile, as the night wore on the outside temp dropped into the high sixties. I reversed the setting on the fan to have it suck the cool night air into my room. It dropped the temp about twenty degrees in a few minutes, and I stopped sweating like I was in a sauna. My dad said nothing.
I think that the heat from the fan’s motor can make the air hotter.
Last week, during a heatwave (temps in the mid to upper 90’s, hot for Connecticut), the office my husband works in had their AC break down. The president of the company brought in fans, but when my husband took the temperature of the air coming out of the fan, it was 4 degrees higher than the air not near the fan.
What a bunch of liberal clap-trap.
These people will ask you to sacrifice anything for their global warming agenda.
It makes a difference when the outside temp is cool. Then it makes sense to suck in the air from outside. But it doesn’t make sense to suck in 95 degree heat from outside to inside. If doing the reverse doesn’t work, then I would do neither.
Yes! And finally, sit in front of the fan wearing nothing but a wet T-shirt, LOL.
“Then it makes sense to suck in the air from outside. But it doesn’t make sense to suck in 95 degree heat from outside to inside. If doing the reverse doesn’t work, then I would do neither.”
Well - that sucks. ;)
I live in Arizona and know this for sure
“we didn’t find any research that met our requirements”
Our requirements were that the research supported our desired outcome.
If so, I could see being without A/C.
I grew up with a “swamp cooler” that cooled our living and dining rooms. NW KS was dry enough that the evaporative cooler was effective.
In the summer, we moved to the basement to sleep. In the winter, you could almost get frost bite down there, so we went back upstairs.
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