kolhapur for the past five days class ix student surajsinh patil has been suffering from a throat infection when his parents took the boy to a doctor in the city he squarely blamed the ongoing dry spell and the dust blown along with the wind for his indisposition such complaints are quite common these days particularly during the last 10 days when the discomfort level because of the dry weather condition has been exceedingly high sights of patients waiting in queues at clinics are common with general practitioners and pediatricians being most in demand on an average a general practitioner is receiving at least 10 cases of heatrelated ailments every day with the temperature hovering around and above 38 degrees celsius weather reports released by the meteorological department have mentioned that the maximum and minimum temperatures of kolhapur have been above normal during the last 10 days d g shinde president of general practitioners association kolhapur said the hot and dry condition during the last few days has badly affected peoples health and the most vulnerable are the infants and children school students are frequently falling ill because they are being unable to get adjusted to the sudden climate change he said the patients are coming up with complaints triggered by dehydration loss of minerals in the body and exposure to hot temperature for long spells dehydration and loss of minerals cause nausea fatigue tiredness and also high fever besides over exposure to heat is causing irritation in eyes and burning and tanning of skin shinde said people should be cautious about what they eat during such a condition for instance bread milk and sweet items turn stale if left exposed to hot temperature for long people should avoid having food at roadside eateries general practitioner vilas mahajan said the ongoing weather has a negative effect on women who are increasingly complaining about urinary tract complications triggered by less intake of water the most vulnerable are the working women the number of public washrooms in the city is few and not all workplaces have ideal facilitiesranjit sawant the expresident of the general practitioners association kolhapur said besides drinking less water another factor leading to ailments like throat infection is drinking of extreme cold beverage particularly aerated drink