US Spain faces waves of deadly heat waves

23:02 04 august 2022

23:02 04 august 2022 Source: rfi.fr

US bakes in extreme heat as federal climate action flops

The U.S. is roasting under an extended heat wave, with 28 states experiencing heat warnings and most Americans exposed to temperatures higher than 90 degrees this past weekend. The deadly weather is severe on its own, but it’s also a sign of what’s to come as the planet heats up due to climate change. And…The deadly weather is severe on its own, but it’s also a sign of what’s to come as the planet heats up due to climate change.

Dans un parc du centre de Madrid pendant une vague de chaleur, le 2 août 2022.

The heat waves wreaight in Spain, a country that knows its third wave these days. According to the Ministry of Health, which itself holds it from the Carlos III Health Institute, mortality due to historical heat reached 2,124 people in July.

With our correspondent in Madrid, François Musseau

These are not statistics proper, nor a number of victims recorded on a case -by -case basis. This is an excess mortality estimate, including the number of deaths expected or likely linked to heat waves, during the month of July, the most murdered of recent decades.

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The heat radiating from the concrete and pavement in these sunbaked neighborhoods is as invisible, and insidious, as the practices that created them.On a blazing summer day, she began gasping for air inside her Petersburg, Virginia, apartment, and was forced to call 911. If she’d been able to look out her window to see the ambulance pull up at Carriage House, an income-based complex for the elderly, she wouldn’t have been able to see a single tree. Just the other side of the sprawling brick building.

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as a comparison, this mortality was 568 people last year at the same period and 581 people in 2020, which means almost the triple of previous two years. And for health authorities, it is an extremely worrying sign of the impact of heat on human health.

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of the unheard of since 1941

for this month of July, we note that 90% of these victims are over 70, including a majority people over 85. We also note that there are more women than men. This second heat wave, in July, is the most intense and longest since 1941.

as for the third heat wave, we will know its impact on health and mortality next month. Currently, 42 of the 50 Spanish provinces have been put on alert.

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