ABSTRACT
Introduction Mountains constitute 24 per cent of the Earth’s surface (UNESCO 2014). Over the years, activities of mountaineering, skiing, via ferrata and hiking are becoming popular (Pomfret 2006; Kruk et al. 2007), all of which form the development of mountaineering tourism. In Nepal, trekking and mountaineering tourists increased from 86,260 in 2011 to 105,015 in 2012 (Manadhar 2013), and about ten million people visited Austria’s Alps every year (Austrian Times 2008). A total of 6,854 people have climbed Mt Everest successfully from the year 1953 to 2013 (Travel Doctor 2014b). Gardner (2007) and Burtscher and Ponchia (2010) highlighted that mountaineering is commonly linked to danger of personal injury and even death. Participants in these activities should be aware of and accept these risks and be responsible for their own actions. Mountaineering is characterized by the ‘deliberate seeking of risk and the uncertainty of outcome’ (Ewert 1989: 8). It carries risks – financial (Sirakaya and Woodside 2005), physical (e.g. injury or death) (Sönmez and Graefe 1998a, 1998b), social (e.g. humiliation) (Carter 1998), emotional (e.g. fear, anxiety) (Mackenzie and Kerr 2012) and also health (Clift and Grabowski 1997; Larsen et al. 2007). While the physical and health risks inherent in adventure tourism are presumably managed by responsible adventure providers, other risks (e.g. psychological and emotional) may be mismanaged, or overlooked entirely, by adventure tourism operators (Mackenzie and Kerr 2012: 128). Ironically, the tourism operators are selling the risk linked with the activities while simultaneously minimizing the adverse impact by taking safety measures into account (Bartkus and Davis 2010; Buckley 2006). This is to circumvent issues such as medical and legal costs, negative image of the operator and injury and fatalities (Bartkus and Davis 2010). There is accumulating evidence of adverse experiences in mountaineering (Bentley et al. 2001b). Groucher and Horrace (2012) recorded the death rate among Everest climbers as 0.87 per cent. In New Zealand, based on hospital discharge and mortality data, mountaineering/tramping are the biggest contributor (50 per cent) of adventure tourism-related mortality (Bentley et al. 2001b). Despite the adverse impact of injury and death, the number of people engaging
in mountaineering continues to grow (Travel Doctor 2014b). Researchers have identified areas of risk associated with the activity such as mountaineers, environments and organizations that contribute to mountaineering injuries (Bentley et al. 2001b, 2001c, 2007). This chapter discusses issues on health and safety in mountaineering. It consists of mountaineering safety and security framework, health ailments and common injuries, general susceptibility and preexisting medical condition, first aid kit, travel insurance and health education communication.
