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Global Progress on Heat Health Priorities Highlighted in New Report
The Global Heat Health Information Network has embarked on a range of activities since it launched in 2018, in response to the urgent need to scale preventive heat action, and repeated calls for harmonization and improvement of our common understanding and decision tools to manage health risks of extreme heat. The 2017-2020 Progress Report reflects on the approaches taken and accomplishments made in advancing priorities over the Network's initial years.
UK 2020 heatwave mortality monitoring shows highest-observed cumulative excess all-cause mortality
Public Health England reports, after controlling for coronavirus, cumulative excess all-cause mortality related to heatwaves in summer 2020 was comparable to impacts during the 2003 pan-European heatwave. How the concurrent risk of COVID-19 and heatwaves may have intersected to amplify these impacts is under investigation.
Healthcare workers get dizzy, headache, thirsty from heat while wearing PPE, S’pore-India study shows
A study of healthcare workers in Singapore and India has found that a majority of those who have to wear personal protective equipment (PPE) experience symptoms of thermal strain, including excessive sweating, exhaustion, and dizziness.
Learn to Map the Urban Heat Island Effect with NASA ARSET
Join NASA ARSET's three-part Satellite Remote Sensing for Urban Heat Islands online training beginning on November 10. This will be ARSET's first training on UHI and is offered in collaboration with the National Integrated Heat Health Information System (NIHHIS) and the Global Heat Health Information Network. Sessions include guest speakers from NASA, USGS, NOAA, and Portland State University. There is no cost to participate and no prior experience is required.
Feeling hot, hot, hot: Caribbean breaks heat records in 2020
Excessive heat is becoming the norm in the Caribbean. This is according to the latest data from the Caribbean Institute for Meteorology and Hydrology (CIMH).
Mask Architects Design Cooling Stations for Abu Dhabi’s Urban Heat Island
Mask Architects has been named one of ten winning teams in the Cool Abu Dhabi a global design competition. Their proposal, The Oasys, is a system where residents of Abu Dhabi can relax and enjoy outdoor spaces without feeling the heat. Selected from more than 1,570 participants across 67 countries, the project aims to tackle the effects of climate change through a localized solution for the urban heat island effect.
Open data on COVID-19 and Heat-Health published
At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, it became clear that poor communities living in high density urban environments across low- and middle-income countries in the Global South would confront the combined effects of COVID-19 and extreme heat. Whilst mitigation measures – such as lock-downs, home quarantines and social distancing – were going to prove difficult for affluent communities who had the means and space to follow them – they looked set to be devastating for communities living in high density informal settlements in urban areas. Mitigation measures looked set to exacerbate already precarious livelihoods by reducing income opportunities and exposing populations to heat stress, by keeping people in poorly insulated and poorly ventilated housing and reducing access to external cooling and hydration infrastructures and services.
US: Heat Emergency Plans Missing Pregnancy, Racial Justice
Many plans by local, state, and federal authorities in the United States to respond to heat extremes and climate change miss the threat that extreme heat poses to pregnancy, particularly for low-income and Black and brown people, Human Rights Watch and partners said today. Authorities should promote racial and reproductive justice and address stark racial disparities in health outcomes.
Video: Homeless LA residents face heat, wildfires, and COVID-19
Residents without housing in Los Angeles now also have to contend with Covid-19, record heat, and smoke-filled air from wildfires.
How heatwave insurance can help cities adapt to climate change
Heatwaves are a challenge faced across the world and only increasing with climate change. One new way to adapt is to mitigate the financial risks they cause by opting for heatwave insurance.
ECMWF moves towards a policy of open data
From today, hundreds of ECMWF forecast charts will become free and accessible to all.
As cities bake on a warming planet, insurers cook up heatwave cover
With extreme heat impacts soaking up a larger share of urban budgets, insurers are seeking ways to reduce financial risks.
Hotter Days Widen Racial Gap in U.S. Schools, Data Shows
Higher temperatures are linked to worse test scores, but only for Black and Hispanic children. The likely culprit: a lack of air-conditioning.
Wildfires tear through drought-racked Paraguay amid record heat
Country faces more than 5,000 fires, with yellow smoke reaching the capital as neighbouring Brazil and Argentina face blazes.
Climate Crisis: Senate Moves to Protect Workers from Heat
Senators Kamala Harris (D-CA) and Sherrod Brown (D-OH) just introduced the “Asunción Valdivia Heat Illness and Fatality Prevention Act of 2020.” The bill, which comes on the heels of record-breaking heat across the Southwest, directs the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to develop a comprehensive, enforceable standard to protect outdoor and indoor workers from the health harms of extreme heat.
Is extreme heat making India unlivable?
2020 is on track to becoming one of the hottest years ever recorded globally. But nowhere is extreme heat and humidity as much a threat as in India.
‘Design as Preventative Care’ Can Mitigate Heat Island Effects
Extreme heat events are projected to happen more frequently, last longer, and be more severe in coming years. Exceedingly high temperatures that currently occur once every twenty years may occur as often as every two to four years by the turn of the next century. These projections are deadly — over the last three decades, extreme heat has caused more fatalities than any other weather-related event in the United States.
August 2020: The warmest summer on record for the Northern Hemisphere comes to an end
The Northern Hemisphere summer ended the way it began, with blistering heat, as summer temperatures across the northern half of the planet were hottest on record, over 2°F above average, according to the latest monthly summary from NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information. Across the entire planet, both August and the June–August period were the second hottest on record, continuing a streak of record- or near record-breaking temperatures that has dominated 2020
Climate explained: will the tropics eventually become uninhabitable?
More than 3.3 billion people live in the tropics, representing about 40% of the world’s population. Despite some areas of affluence, such as Singapore, the tropics are also home to about 85% of the world’s poorest people and are therefore particularly susceptible to the impacts of climate change.
Western Heat and Wildfires Rage On, with Millions at Risk
The health risks of searing heat and wildfires are growing, and climate change is making things worse.
A Climate Reckoning in Fire-Stricken California
Multiple mega fires burning more than three million acres. Millions of residents smothered in toxic air. Rolling blackouts and triple-digit heat waves. Climate change, in the words of one scientist, is smacking California in the face.
Heat kills. Why don’t we talk about it that way?
Who isn’t mourning the waning weeks of summer? It’s the season most people look forward to all year. Long days on the beach, 9 p.m. sunsets, perfect tomatoes: What more could you want?
Poor Neighborhoods Feel Brunt Of Rising Heat. Cities Are Mapping Them To Bring Relief
NPR. This summer volunteers are fanning out in 13 cities across the U.S. to — quite literally — take the temperature of their neighborhoods. It's part of a project to help protect people as the world warms, and in many places it's highlighting how the poorest areas suffer most from rising urban heat.
Hong Kong’s hot nights and even hotter days bring higher risk of mortality for women and the elderly, new study finds
Consecutive hot nights pose a higher risk to public health than hot days, and bring a 6 per cent higher risk of death for women and the elderly, a study by a Hong Kong university has found.
Halfway to boiling: the city at 50C
It is the temperature at which human cells start to cook, animals suffer and air conditioners overload power grids. Once an urban anomaly, 50C is fast becoming reality.
Last decade was Earth’s hottest on record as climate crisis accelerates
The past decade was the hottest ever recorded globally, with 2019 either the second or third warmest year on record, as the climate crisis accelerated temperatures upwards worldwide, scientists have confirmed.
Here’s What Extreme Heat Looks Like: Profoundly Unequal
Earth is overheating. This year is poised to be one of the hottest ever. Millions are already feeling the pain, but the agony of extreme heat is profoundly unequal across the globe.
Heatwave Harry? As temperatures soar, naming the threat may save lives
Giving heatwaves names and ratings - much like hurricanes - could help people understand the growing threat, heat experts say.
Rising temperatures will cause more deaths than all infectious diseases – study
Poorer, hotter parts of the world will struggle to adapt to unbearable conditions, research finds.
Life and Death in Our Hot Future Will Be Shaped by Today’s Income Inequality
Your future risk of dying from heat will be determined more than anything else by where you live and the local consequences of today’s economic inequality. That’s the conclusion of a major paper released today by the Climate Impact Lab, a research consortium that spent years mapping the relationship between temperature, income, and mortality
As workers sweat, pressure grows on employers to turn down the heat
As global temperatures rise, workers are increasingly struggling to cope with heat on the job and companies are starting to adapt their practices.
Eat or stay cool? Cities test ways to protect the poor from rising heat
From spray parks in water-short Cape Town to heat-reflecting pavements in Tokyo, cities around the world that face worsening heatwaves as the planet warms are rapidly adopting innovations to try to beat increasingly deadly heat.
Heat Health Dialogues
Find recordings from our Heat in the City and Heat in the Workplace dialogues.
Climate change causes health threats in Finland too
The climate change is causing temperatures to rise in Finland more than they are rising on average elsewhere in the world. “Longer heat waves with higher temperatures pose even greater risks on older people and those with chronic conditions,” says Lanki.
Climate change: Summers could become ‘too hot for humans’
Millions of people around the world could be exposed to dangerous levels of heat stress - a dangerous condition which can cause organs to shut down.
How to Find Relief During Summer Heat Waves in the City
Extreme heat is already a public health threat—now, COVID-19 may make that impact worse. Here are some quick tips and long-term strategies to help keep you and your neighbors cool.
Why Africa’s heatwaves are a forgotten impact of climate change
Recent summers have demonstrated dramatically that heatwaves are not only deadly, but they are already being influenced by human-induced climate change.
Better African heatwave data could save lives, shield economies, report says
Heatwaves over the last century in sub-Saharan Africa have not been properly recorded, undermining early warning systems to save lives and prevent economic losses caused by soaring temperatures, a University of Oxford report said on Monday.
Scarcity of shade hurts Indian street vendors’ income, health
As heatwaves become more commonplace, lack of shade in can have devastating effects on those who live and work on city streets
Heat Health Masterclass Series
Rapid, interactive learning of best practices and science for essential applications in heat health, taught by leading experts in the field.
New scientific opinion on ‘Adaptation to climate change-related health effects’ recommends more support for resilience of the health sector
Today, the European Commission’s independent Group of Chief Scientific Advisors (SAM) published their opinion ‘Adaptation to climate change-related health effects’ which contains advice and recommendations on how the EU can help to make our societies, and in particular health sector, better prepared and more resilient with respect to impacts from climate change on health.
New Podcast: Can’t Take the Heat
Host Roop Singh approaches the biggest challenges posed by climate change, like more intense and frequent heatwaves, from a humanitarian perspective. How will the impacts of climate change affect people around the world? What are the big solutions that are in the works? How do we make them happen? The podcast features experts from around the world including leading scientists developing climate solutions, and humanitarian volunteers telling stories of climate change from the frontlines of disasters.
Extreme Heat and COVID-19 Info Series
Information for decision-makers on managing the combined risks of extreme heat and COVID-19.
Umbrellas for social distancing: The Kerala way of fighting COVID-19
In a bid to ensure social distancing, the Thanneermukkom Gram Panchayat in Kerala's Alappuzha district has come up with a unique initiative - every resident will step out with an umbrella.
Summer heat waves could be deadlier because of COVID-19, health officials warn
As summer descends on the U.S., public health experts are warning that the coronavirus could make intense heat waves deadlier, adding to the devastating death toll the country has suffered.
13 Cities Launch Urban Heat Island Community Science Campaigns in 2020 with NOAA
NOAA will support and coordinate 13 community science Urban Heat Island (UHI) mapping field campaigns in cities across the country this summer.
Extreme, high temperatures may double or triple heart-related deaths
People living in inherently hot regions of the world may be at particularly high risk of heat-related cardiovascular death.
New model helps explain seasonal variations in urban heat islands
Rising temperatures and shifting rainfall patterns linked to climate change may alter the seasonality of urban heat islands in coming decades. A new model simplifies predictions of 'urban heat islands' based on temperature, sunlight and rainfall.
South Asia Heat Health Summit
The South Asia Heat Health Summit took place on 14 February 2020 in Pune, India, in conjunction with the International Conference on Climate Services 6.
Gambia’s labouring farmers show why premature births may boom in a warmer world
Researchers are tracking the risks facing Gambia's pregnant farmers and their babies as climate change brings more heat extremes.
Heatwaves in 2019 led to almost 900 extra deaths in England
Analysis shows impact of climate emergency in year of record temperatures.
Heatwaves and Health in the Sahel
The Ministry of Health of Senegal and The Senegal National Agency of Civil Aviation and Meteorology (ANACIM), conducted a regional training workshop that brought together meteorologists and health professionals from Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, and Senegal to learn how to use heatwave forecasts to prepare a heatwave early warning system and issue outlooks of impacts of extreme heat on human health.
How to keep cool in a blackout during a heatwave
If there is no power for air-conditioning, and tap water is the only resource available, spreading it across the skin is the best way to prevent the body overheating irrespective of the climate, according to a new study from the University of Sydney.
Commit to ambitious climate action, including building resilience for heat health
Many of the same actions that can reduce the carbon emissions that are driving climate change can also bring improve health and wellbeing. We encourage you to act on health at the UNSG 2019 Climate Action Summit by committing to one of the goals of the Social and Political Drivers coalition.
Heat Health Advisory and Readiness Actions for Chile
Responding to increasingly frequent heatwaves is an emerging demand on Chile's health sector. In August 2019, global experts gathered in Santiago to review current mechanisms for predicting and responding to heatwaves, and to identify opportunities to improve forecasting, preparedness and the human impact focus for heat health in the context of the country’s climate change adaptation policy and emergency preparedness and response system.
Call to Action from the Global Heat Health Information Network
The Global Heat Health Information Network Call to Action was launched in May during the UNDRR Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction in Geneva, to highlight critical steps to strengthen heat action.
First Global Forum on Heat and Health held in Hong Kong, China
Extreme heat poses a serious and growing risk in all world regions, but heat-related deaths are largely preventable. The First Global Forum on Heat and Health, held in Hong Kong, China, from 17 - 20 December 2018, addressed this challenge and formally launched the Global Heat Health Information Network.
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