Rita Panahi: Power bills put the vulnerable at greater risk
Rising power bills annoy most Victorians but for the vulnerable they can be a risk to their wellbeing, writes Rita Panahi.
Rita Panahi
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Something has gone wrong when a prosperous, first-world nation has elderly people dying from hypothermia because they are reluctant to turn on their heaters in the coldest months of the year.
Soaring electricity prices see not only pensioners but increasing numbers of working people reluctant to heat their homes properly.
The same phenomenon occurs in summer where householders are loathe to turn on air conditioners for fear of receiving a massive bill.
Last week we learnt that across two inner-city emergency departments, more than 200 patients presented with hypothermia, with 23 people dying, over a seven-year period to 2016.
The research was conducted by doctors at The Alfred and researchers from Monash University and published in the Internal Medicine Journal.
The findings have appalled professionals including study author Michelle Ananda-Rajah who called the results “shocking”.
“Do these people have adequate social supports? What are their homes like? Do they have the means for adequate heating? When you start scratching the surface you start to see pretty worrisome patterns,” Dr Ananda-Rajah said.
“We have this image of ourselves as the sunburnt country, with all public health campaigns about the dangers of heat stress. But in the southern states, we have a very long cold season that stretches beyond the three months of winter. This is very contentious right now with all the debate around energy prices. It’s speculative, but you do wonder, there are pockets of disadvantage even in metropolitan Melbourne.
“We’re seeing patients who are clearly coming in profoundly hypothermic and being found indoors. Hypothermia is generally not something that happens suddenly … when you get to a certain temperature, you’re vulnerable to sudden death.”
About 80 per cent of the patients presenting with hypothermic emergency were found indoors and close to three quarters of all patients were pensioners.
The study findings are all the more terrible when you consider they are for just a couple of emergency departments and only up to 2016.
Since then energy prices have increased further and one shudders to think what the numbers would be if a study was conducted across all emergency departments in the country.
The Victorian government’s climate change policies are set to exasperate an already woeful situation with emission targets that will put further pressure on retail prices and the cheapest sources of energy.
Dan Andrews’ government wants to dramatically cut emissions and is considering a plan to slash emissions by up to 39 per cent from 2005 levels by 2025 and by up to 60 per cent by 2030.
The closure of Hazelwood in 2017, which provided about 22 per cent of the state’s energy, came about after the Victorian government tripled the tax on brown coal.
At the time we were assured by state Labor the closure would not see a spike in prices nor a fall in reliability.
But prices have gone north and earlier this year, in the height of the summer heat, we were told to turn off our air conditioners and delay using dishwashers and washing machines to avoid a blackout.
That didn’t stop more than 200,000 homes and businesses being without power after a massive blackout on one of the hottest days of the year.
It emerged this week Victoria’s ambitious emission cut targets could see the Yallourn power station, one of the state’s biggest coal-fired plants that provides about 22 per cent of Victoria’s electricity, closing early.
The Herald Sun reported EnergyAustralia has briefed workers and conceded growing policy uncertainty, particularly the Victorian government’s 50 per cent renewable target, could lead to it being closed ahead of schedule.
Successive state and federal governments have embraced climate change policies that have sunk billions into renewable sources of energy and neglected gas, coal and nuclear.
The preoccupation with emission cuts rather than affordability has seen Australia have some of the most expensive energy costs in the world, despite being blessed with abundant resources, including the world’s biggest reserves of uranium and being a leading producer of coal.
Australia dodged a bullet when it kicked federal Labor and its radical energy policies to the kerb at the May 18 poll. But the current state of affairs remains grim, with sky high bills putting pensioners and low and middle-income families under financial strain.
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Figures released earlier this year by the Australian Energy Market Operator show those on low incomes in Victoria are spending up to $1 out of every $7 of their disposable income on electricity and gas bills.
It is no wonder some are turning off their heating and jeopardising their health to avoid crippling bills.
Rita Panahi is a Herald Sun columnist
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