According to the UN and Red Cross report, experts predict very high death rates from extreme heat, “comparable in magnitude, by the end of the century, to all cancers”.
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Their findings are alarming. Entire regions of the globe will become unlivable in the coming decades due to more frequent and intense heat waves under the effect of climate change, warned the UN and the Red Cross on Monday (October 10th).
Less than a month before COP27, which is to take place in November in Egypt, the UN and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) call in a joint report to prepare for the upcoming heat waves to avoid large numbers of deaths.
These organizations point out that there are limits beyond which people exposed to extreme heat and humidity cannot survive and that there are also limits beyond which societies can no longer adapt. “Under current trajectories, heat waves could reach and exceed these physiological and social limits in the coming decades, especially in regions such as the Sahel, South Asia and Southwest Asia”they write.
Such a situation will result in “large-scale suffering and loss of life, population movements and worsening inequalities”, warn the two organizations. According to the report, almost everywhere reliable statistics are available, heat waves are the deadliest weather hazard.
They already kill thousands of people each year and will become more and more deadly as climate change increases, announce in the report Martin Griffiths, head of the UN humanitarian agency, and Jagan Chapagain, secretary General of the IFRC. According to the report, experts predict very high death rates from extreme heat, “comparable in magnitude, by the end of the century, to all cancers”.