The latest tragedy occurred on November 1 in the Charkhiy residential area of Kokand, where five members of one family died from suspected carbon monoxide poisoning, a source told Kun.uz.
The victims included three girls aged seven, three and one.
An initial inspection found that the house was equipped with a Vaillant double-circuit heating boiler. Its flue pipe had become detached from its installation point, potentially allowing combustion gases to enter the home.
The Fergana Regional Emergency Situations Department subsequently issued an urgent warning to residents, calling on anyone who had installed a Vaillant boiler to stop using it.
According to the department, the German-made boilers had reached the end of their service life and were no longer suitable for use.
The agency claimed that the equipment had previously been used in Germany and sent for disposal before being illegally brought into Uzbekistan by traders as spare parts. It alleged that the discarded boilers were then modified in makeshift conditions and fraudulently sold to consumers as new products.
The department also said the boilers had been imported without their original flue systems, which are an essential component of the equipment. Instead, polyethylene pipes had been fitted, which the agency said were unsuitable for operating temperatures and could lose their rigidity when exposed to heat.
The latest deaths follow another mass fatality in the region on October 25, when seven members of a family died from carbon monoxide poisoning in Chimyon village, Fergana district.
The regional emergency department has urged residents not to install Vaillant boilers and to have other heating equipment installed only by qualified specialists. It also advised consumers to carefully check quality certificates, operating instructions and whether the equipment is fit for use.
