TOPSHOT - A vendor with an umbrella over his head talks on mobile phone as he wipes his face with a cloth on a hot summer day in Varanasi on May 27, 2024. (Photo by Niharika KULKARNI / AFP) (Photo by NIHARIKA KULKARNI/AFP via Getty Images)
Asia's Deadly Heat Crisis Sparks UN Warning and New Survival Projects
Two new integrated projects to protect South Asians from the rapidly escalating threat of extreme heat have been announced.
The two new initiatives, funded by the Rockefeller Foundation and the charitable foundation Wellcome, aim to strength the region's ability to detect, prepare, and respond to extreme heat and other weather-related health impacts.
The first project is the South Asia Climate-Health Desk, which has been established as part of the World Meteorological Organization and the World Health Organization's joint climate and health programme.
The new unit will help meteorological institutions and health partners in South Asia work closely and develop early warning tools and risk assessments.
It will also aim to help regional stakeholders develop, validate, and share weather and climate information so communities and authorities can act quickly before and during dangerous heat events and other health risks, including disease outbreaks.
The second project is the South Asia the South Asia Scientific Research Consortium, will deepen the region's scientific understanding of how heat affects different populations.
The consortium aims to develop tailored heat‐risk thresholds and ultimately strengthen heat action planning across the region.
A recent study by researchers at the University of Oxford warned half the world's population will be living with extreme heat by 2050 if average global temperatures rise over the next 25 years by 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.
The United Nations secretary-general António Guterres has also called for urgent global action to address the growing risk of extreme heat worldwide
According to the World Meteorological Organization, Asia is warming nearly twice as fast as the global average, intensifying extreme weather and placing growing pressure on lives and livelihoods, economies, and ecosystems across the region.
In India and Pakistan, pre-monsoon temperatures regularly rise above 50 degrees Celsius and heat-related mortality in the region today exceeds 200,000 deaths per year.
At the same time, extreme heat has also been known to undermine economic stability.
In 2024 alone, heat exposure led to 247 billion potential labor hours lost being lost in India, leading to an estimated $194 billion loss in income, according to the Lancet Countdown.
The Rockefeller Foundation's vice president for health, Manisha Bhinge said South Asia is at the "frontline of the heat crisis" in an interview.
Bhinge added the region has always faced high temperatures, but in the recent years there have been a number of persistent, long-running heatwaves, which are testing the "limits of survivability".
She said recent heatwaves have led to a genuine interest in developing solutions and making climate science meaningful for public health.
"We are looking at almost eight times more days of extreme heat a year in certain parts of South Asia in the next several decades," she told me.
"Those higher temperatures, both in the daytime and night-time, and the longer duration of those higher temperatures, will mean the human body needs to function in a fundamentally different way in order to maintain healthy functions."
Bhinge added the two newly-announced projects will help make climate science relevant to public health services and help them develop "countermeasures against extreme heat".
Dr. Alan Dangour, director of climate and health at Wellcome, said rising temperatures due to climate change are a public health threat, in a statement.
Dr. Dangour added extreme heat is hitting South Asian communities hard, particularly children, pregnant people, older people, outdoor workers and those communities with the least resources to respond.
"We need to invest in science-led solutions that both cut emissions and build resilience, with public health at the core of decision-making," he said.
In November, a new global coalition of more than 30 cities pledged to tackle the issue of extreme heat.
And during the recent annual Mumbai Climate Week event, the Global Energy Alliance for People and Planet also launched a new national platform to accelerate India's grid modernization and power distribution reform.
The India Grids of the Future Accelerator platform aims to modernise power distribution, integrate renewable energy and storage, and prepare India's grids for rapid demand growth.
It has also been designed to advance India's twin priorities of economic growth and energy transition under the government of India's Viksit Bharat 2047 vision.
