Climate justice and heat deaths

One of the recurring themes of climate change is the disconnect between cause and effect. Those most responsible for causing climate change are insulated from its effects, while the damage of climate change falls on those with the smallest carbon footprints. There are multiple dimensions to this, and last week The Lancet highlighted another one.

In their latest annual report on health and climate change, they have mapped the distribution of heat related deaths. It follows a pattern seen elsewhere, in maps of climate vulnerability, harvest loss and other measures of climate damage: Africa is the continent most affected, despite having contributed the least to global emissions.

Worldwide, over half a million people died last year from heat related conditions. That’s a number that has risen starkly, partly because the population has been rising, and also because it’s hotter. In the 1990s around 5.9 deaths per 100,000 were heat related. That has increased to 7.2. While everyone is more exposed to heatwave conditions, it is obviously going to be most dangerous in places that are already very hot. Deaths from heat are higher in North Africa and the Middle East.

Other injustices lurk behind these statistics, as climate change picks on the weakest. One is generational injustice. Those most at risk of heat death are newborn and unborn babies on one side, and over 65s on the other. Those with underlying chronic health conditions are at higher risk.

Climate change also picks on those on the margins socially – the richest can afford to keep cool or have the luxury of being able to stay in the shade. People who do outdoor manual labour face much higher risk than those who work indoors. Construction and agriculture are worst affected and in the Middle East, workers in these sectors will often be migrants from poorer countries.

Heat related mortality is only one aspect of the suffering and damage that global warming causes. Because it affects outdoor work, increased heat directly affects working days and the economy. It ripples into mental health. Lancet even point out that we get a worse night’s sleep when it’s too hot, and attempts to quantify “annual sleep loss attributable to suboptimal night-time temperatures”.

The flipside of these interconnected injustices is that the solutions are also interconnected. When we eliminate fossil fuels and reduce emissions, we improve outcomes for some of the world’s most vulnerable people. Climate action saves lives.