Campaigners calling for greater awareness of the risks of carbon monoxide are to meet Foreign Office minister Hamish Falconer as part of their crusade.
The minister will talk with the family of Hudson Foley (pictured) – a 24-year-old traveller who died from carbon monoxide poisoning in Ecuador – and the Safer Tourism Foundation, which set up the Pack Safe Appeal in Foley’s honour.
News of the meeting came after the issue was debated last week in Westminster Hall, following lobbying by Hudson Foley’s mother Cathy Foley.
In December, she had shared her son’s story with her MP, Dr Al Pinkerton (Liberal Democrat), of Surrey Heath, to ask for more to be done to warn travellers of the risks of carbon monoxide poisoning and to encourage people to carry portable alarms.
Dr Pinkerton then met the Foley family and other families impacted by CO poisoning, as well as the Safer Tourism Foundation and the all-party parliamentary CO group (APPCOG) to provide more information and help make recommendations to government.
This resulted in a letter sent to the FCDO setting out Safer Tourism’s requests, which are to update country-specific travel advice to include warnings about carbon monoxide poisoning risks and amend the guidance and foreign travel checklist pages to provide clear advice on CO safety.
The letter also asked the FCDO to encourage travellers to carry portable carbon monoxide alarms and to launch a public information campaign to ensure that travellers are aware of the risks and how to protect themselves.
More: Safer Tourism Foundation backs carbon monoxide travel campaign
Safer Tourism said the initial response from the FCDO “left a lot to be desired”.
The charity said in a statement: “They suggested that country travel advice can only be updated once sufficient evidence of risk has been recorded – however they failed to share what these thresholds are – and pointed to their Travel Aware campaign as evidence to demonstrate their public awareness campaigns.
“However, as it stands, only China and Nepal country pages include CO poisoning risk warnings and Travel Aware campaigns have never focused on or even mentioned the dangers of CO poisoning.”
Following last week’s debate – titled Government advice on risks of carbon monoxide poisoning when travelling – the Safer Tourism Foundation commented: “While a final decision has yet to be made regarding our specific campaign asks, there are a lot of positives to report following the debate.
“There was clear cross-party support for a simple change to be made to the FCDO’s travel advice pages, to include information about the risks of carbon monoxide poisoning on every country page because CO poisoning can occur anywhere fuel is burnt, from tents and hostels to luxury hotels and Airbnb-type accommodation.”
MPs Andrew Rosindell (Conservative), Edward Morello (Liberal Democrat) and Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party) made speeches in support of the Pack Safe Appeal in the debate.
Falconer said that for some countries, such as China and Nepal “where carbon monoxide poisoning is a higher risk, we include specific information on that in our travel advice, based on local reports and consular case trends”.
He added: “We always consider the arguments for changes to travel advice on their merits. We must make judgments, try to consider all risks proportionately and consider the best way to ensure that advice is presented to travellers.”
Katherine Atkinson, Safer Tourism’s chief executive, said: “At Safer Tourism Foundation we will continue to encourage all travellers to consider taking their own travel CO alarm with them when they go overseas, because it could save their life.
“It has been a privilege to work alongside Hudson’s mum, the indefatigable Cathy Foley, to try and secure a positive change out of her family’s tragic loss through the Pack Safe Appeal.”