Translated automatically by AI from the Italian original.
TREVISO – A house cat’s insistent and unusual behaviour prevented a potential family tragedy in the Treviso hinterland, where two households – six people in all, including two young children – were saved from carbon monoxide poisoning caused by a faulty boiler.
The incident occurred yesterday when a 29-year-old woman began to experience sudden dizziness and light-headedness inside her home.
The cat’s warning and emergency admission
What prompted the young woman to pay immediate attention to her health was also her cat’s continuous and unusual meowing. Even so, she got behind the wheel to go to work, only to find the symptoms persisted away from home. She then pulled over and promptly called the 118 emergency services.
- The medics’ suspicion: The 118 paramedics suspected carbon monoxide poisoning and ordered her immediate transfer to Ca’ Foncello hospital in Treviso.
- The alarm in the block of flats: After detecting toxic fumes even on the building’s stairs, the rescue teams evacuated and took to the emergency room as a precaution the woman’s husband and the neighbours on the floor above (a couple with two children aged three and six months).
Hyperbaric chamber treatment and Fire Brigade findings
Medical checks on the 29-year-old revealed poisoning levels so high that she had to be transferred for emergency treatment in a hyperbaric chamber, which concluded successfully this morning. Her husband and the family on the upper floor were discharged last night.
An inspection by the Fire Brigade confirmed that the carbon monoxide leak was caused by a malfunctioning boiler which, once switched on, released extremely high concentrations of the colourless, odourless gas. The episode follows by a few days another serious incident in the Treviso area, where ten people in Follina and Loria had to seek hospital treatment for the same reason.
