Your cosy home comforts could make you seriously ill: As Britons snuggle down in front of the fire for Christmas, experts have an ominous warning - and even scented candles aren't safe
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Amid winter’s freezing grip, it’s the season for cosy home comforts (or Hygge, as it’s known in Denmark), in the shape of crackling wood fires, flickering scented candles to perfume our snugly draught-proofed homes – and the tempting aroma of a hot meal bubbling on the cooker.
![[Professor Chris Whitty, former chief medical officer for England, warned in 2022 that more eco-friendly stoves still produce 450 times more toxic air pollution than gas central heating]](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2024/12/19/10/93308257-14209383-image-a-13_1734604371973.jpg)
Alarmingly however, scientists are warning that all of these may raise our risk of developing serious illnesses including cardiovascular disease, dementia, depression and lung cancer. This is because they release millions of minute particles and toxic chemical gases that damage our tissues.
![[Burning scented candles also comes with a risk as experts say they can produce chemicals which include gases such as carbon monoxide and sulphur dioxide]](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2024/12/19/11/93309725-14209383-image-a-5_1734606341103.jpg)
Most worrying at this time of year is the temptation to snuggle up to a trendy wood-burning stove. Latest figures from the UK wood-burner industry, the Stove Industry Association (SIA), show Britons have been buying them at record levels – snapping up more than 2,000 of them in 2022, a 40 per cent rise from the previous year.
Meanwhile, a report by the Institute of Fiscal Studies warned three-quarters of UK domestic combustion emissions (which also include gas boilers and cookers) in 2022, came from wood-burning. Indeed as well as sending smoke up the chimney, wood-burning stoves fill our indoor air with very harmful substances, especially sooty particulate matter, known as PM2.5 – which measure 2.5 micrometres or less in diameter; about 3 per cent the width of a human hair.
