Every year around 489,000 people die around the world due to extreme heat, especially in Asia (45% of the total) and Europe (36%), and this meteorological phenomenon is the one that causes the greatest mortality.
These data appear in the latest edition of the 'State of Climate Services Report', led by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) - a UN agency specialized in weather, climate and water - with contributions from nearly 40 institutions, including UN agencies, scientific institutions, international organizations, universities, including the Barcelona Supercomputing Center and the Catalan Institution for Research and Advanced Studies (Icrea).
The report focuses on health and highlights the need for personalized climate information and services to support the healthcare sector in the face of more extreme weather conditions, poor air quality, changing patterns of infectious diseases, and food and water insecurity.
“Virtually the entire planet has experienced heat waves this year. The emergence of El Niño in 2023 will greatly increase the likelihood of breaking even more temperature records, causing more extreme heat in many parts of the world and in the ocean, and making the challenge even greater,” said Petteri Taalas, Secretary General of the WMO.
According to the Director General of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, “the climate crisis is a health crisis that causes more severe and unpredictable weather events, fuels disease outbreaks and contributes to higher rates of non-toxic diseases. “transmissible.”
Climate change threatens to reverse decades of progress toward better health and well-being, especially in the most vulnerable communities. Almost three quarters of national meteorological and hydrological services provide climate data to the health sector, but its use is limited. Less than a quarter of Health Ministries have a surveillance system that uses weather information to track climate-sensitive health risks.
The report dedicates a special section to extreme heat, which is the deadliest weather phenomenon. Between 2000 and 2019 there were 489,000 deaths annually from this cause and it is estimated that the extreme heat conditions during the summer of 2022 claimed more than 60,000 fatalities in 35 European countries.
Heat waves also exacerbate air pollution, which is already responsible for seven million premature deaths each year and is the fourth leading cause of death by health risk factor.
However, the impacts are underestimated, as heat-related mortality could be 30 times higher than currently recorded.
Extreme heat causes the highest mortality of all weather events, but only half of the affected countries have heat warning services for health decision makers.
According to 'Lancet Countdown on Health and Climate Change', rising temperatures and the growing population over 65 years of age have caused an increase in heat-related mortality in this age group of 68% between 2017 and 2021, compared with the five-year period 2000-2004.
According to the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), there is “high confidence” that Central and South America, southern Europe, South and Southeast Asia, and Africa will be the most vulnerable areas. affected by climate change in terms of heat-related mortality by 2100.
Furthermore, climate change exacerbates the risks of food insecurity. Between 2012 and 2021, 29% more global land area was affected by extreme droughts for at least one month per year than in the period 1951-1960.
Concerns related to air quality, climate change and health are interrelated. Climate mitigation measures to reduce air pollution can save lives. But only 2% of climate finance commitments made by international development financiers in poor and emerging countries are aimed at addressing air pollution (between 2015 and 2021), despite it being the most dangerous environmental threat to the world. health.
In 2019, air pollution rose from fifth to fourth place on the scale of leading global death risk factors and continued to outpace the impacts of other widely recognized risk factors for chronic diseases, such as obesity, cardiovascular disease and malnutrition. .
On the other hand, the aggravated impacts of droughts and heat wave days were associated with 98 million more people reporting moderate to severe food insecurity in 2020 than annually in 1981-2010.
Changing climate conditions are also increasing the transmission of many vector-, food-, and water-borne climate-sensitive infectious diseases. For example, dengue is the most rapidly spreading vector-borne disease in the world, while the length of the malaria transmission season has increased in some parts of the world.
