Keeping Your Baby Cool Through Pakistan's Summers and Power Cuts
Babies overheat faster than adults. How to keep yours cool and hydrated through Pakistan's summer heat and long power cuts, and the warning signs.
Keeping Your Baby Cool Through Pakistan's Summers and Power Cuts
When Karachi's heat index climbed towards the 60s during the deadly June 2015 heatwave, the very young were among the most at risk. Babies heat up faster than adults, sweat less efficiently, and can't tell you they're thirsty — and a long load-shedding spell removes the fan just when it's needed most. A little planning keeps your baby safe.
Why babies overheat first
A small body has more skin for its size, a still-developing sweat system, and no way to ask for water or move somewhere cooler. Heat exhaustion can creep up fast in an infant left in a hot room — or, catastrophically, in a parked car, which becomes an oven within minutes. Never leave a baby alone in a car, not even for "two minutes."
Hydration by age
- Under 6 months: do not give water. Instead, breastfeed more often — the milk is mostly water and adjusts to the weather. Formula-fed babies can take their usual feeds a little more frequently.
- 6 months and over: offer small sips of cooled, boiled water between feeds, alongside continued milk feeds.
Cooling tricks that work without electricity
Load-shedding means the fan and AC can't be relied on, so keep low-tech options ready:
- Dress the baby in loose, light cotton — or just a nappy indoors on the worst days.
- Give a lukewarm (not cold) sponge or bath to bring the temperature down.
- Hang a damp cotton cloth in the breeze, or gently wave a hand fan — evaporation off wet skin cools well.
- Stay in the coolest part of the house — a lower floor, a shaded room — through the afternoon peak, and keep curtains drawn against the sun.
- Keep a charged rechargeable fan or power bank for the hours the electricity is gone.
- Plan outings for early morning or after sunset, never the midday furnace.
Prickly heat (ghamori)
Those little red prickly bumps are almost a rite of summer here. They're not dangerous, but they itch and signal your baby is too warm. Keep the skin cool and dry, dress lightly, use cool baths, and let the skin air. If it looks infected — pus, spreading redness — have it checked.
Signs a baby is dangerously hot or dry
Get help quickly if you notice:
- Far fewer wet nappies, or dark, strong-smelling urine
- A sunken soft spot, no tears when crying, a dry mouth
- Hot, flushed skin and fast breathing
- Drowsiness, floppiness, refusing feeds, or a weak, high cry
These point to dehydration or heat illness, which in a baby is an emergency, not a wait-and-see.
Should your baby show any sign of serious overheating, treat it as urgent and get medical help straight away rather than hoping it passes.