AUSTIN, Texas -- As COVID-19 continues to keep many of Texas’s most vulnerable indoors, health advocates say that brings about another concern - the heat.

What You Need To Know


  • Heat the number one weather-related killer

  • Austin-based Family Eldercare has handed out thousands of fans 

  • Organization is struggling to keep up with demand amid coronavirus pandemic

  • Donations still being accepted 

“So today we are going to visit a veteran who I am working with, and he’s going to receive a fan,” said Dylan Lowery, a case manager with Austin-based Family Eldercare’s rehousing program.

Lowery says that fan is one of thousands that have already been handed out by Family Eldercare so far this year. Normally the nonprofit coordinates the distribution of 7,000 fans during its annual Summer Fan Drive, but this year the organization is already having trouble keeping up with demand.

“This summer it’s very different,” said Lowery.  “People have lost income and they’re having to stay home and run their ACs more throughout the day - meaning that their electric bill is more expensive.”

RELATED: How COVID-19 Could Increase Heat Deaths

Many right now can’t fathom being able to pay an increased electric bill, much less an average bill - people like Lowery’s client Timothy Minter, a formerly homeless veteran who had been working as a stage hand.

“If there was anybody hit by this coronavirus other than bartenders, waitresses, people in that profession, it’d be gig workers like myself,” said Minter, who was expecting to make most of his money working SXSW events this year.

Minter considers himself to be more fortunate than others. Lowery is helping him get more financial assistance, and he does luckily have air conditioning. 

But there are thousands more in Central Texas who either can’t afford their electric bill or don’t have AC altogether. It’s why the heat is consistently the number one weather-related killer in the United States.

“It’s not floods, it’s not hurricanes, tornadoes - it’s people dying of heat-related illness,” lamented Lowery, adding that fans can mean the difference between life and death for older adults, younger children, and others who have difficulties naturally regulating their body temperature.

“At minimum it reduces their body temperature by eight degrees, which is better than nothing,” said Lowery.

The warehouse Family Eldercare’s Summer Fan Drive fans are stored inside of is typically hard to maneuver about - normally stocked full of fans for distribution. But with only a few dozen left in stock, Fan Drive organizers are concerned they may run out, especially with hot temperatures on the horizon.

For more information on how you can help Family Eldercare’s Summer Fan Drive, click here. 

 

Timothy Minter meets with a Family Eldercare rep in this image from July 2020. (Matthew Mershon/Spectrum News)