Written by Emma Shrestha, PhD student with SCENARIO DTP, University of Reading.
2024 is on track to gain a new award, the hottest year on record. As temperatures soar and the COP goal of 1.5C is becoming increasingly unattainable, attention must be placed on how people are going to survive the health repercussions caused by a warmer world. The consequences of extreme heat are becoming increasingly dangerous, so much so that the UN Secretary-General, António Guterres, made a call to action to all countries on addressing extreme heat.
It is 18th of November 2024, Health Day at COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan. In the Blue Zone the World Health Organisation (WHO) is holding a panel discussion on “Building resilience to heat extremes in urban settings” at the Health Pavilion. The aim of this panel is to highlight how urban infrastructure is unfit for the accelerating heat which will exacerbate the direct health impacts of heat, social inequalities, and the next steps needed to be taken to ameliorate these issues.
To commence the panel discussion, we heard Nunzia Gatta, an 82-year-old woman in Italy describing her experience in this year’s heatwaves “We never reach 40 degrees. Never. Sweating a lot. Not eating. Really, I don’t feel like eating. Not sleeping properly, you see. And stomach problems that you can think is your heart.” Nunzia emphasises the direct health implications of heat which is often discussed as an issue for the vulnerable but in reality, can also cause devastating acute and chronic health consequences to healthy individuals.
Exposure to high heat can put a strain on peoples’ bodies as they try to cool themselves, exacerbating pre-existing cardiovascular and kidney issues, and diabetes. When exposed chronically to heat, this stress can lead to the development of long-term health conditions which is a particular issue for outdoor workers in tropical regions.
Due to the urban heat island effect people in urban areas are often exposed to higher temperatures than those in nearby rural settings. During the panel discussion, Vincent Karremans the Dutch Minister for Sport, Youth and Prevention, suggested ways in which the local government can incorporate heat relieving infrastructure when planning cities to combat the urban heat island effect. He pushed the importance of trees for shade and emitting water vapour into the air for reducing temperatures, however, due to their high planting and maintenance costs it is often better to couple greening cities with other societal needs such as recreation or education so that infrastructure projects are multifunctional. A problem that Mr. Karremans identified is how little space there is to erect infrastructure. He believes the swathes of dark surfaced roads absorbing and intensifying heat could be reclaimed to plant shading trees and encourage people on to bicycles killing two birds with one stone: reducing heat and encouraging healthy activities. He suggests that local governments to keep in mind the 4 Ms when planning infrastructure “Multifunctionality, maintenance, mobility, and multisectoral.”
Ronald Law the director of the Health Emergency Management Bureau at the Department of Health of the Philippines emphasised that extreme heat events can exacerbate social inequalities. This year the highest heat index recorded in the Philippines was 53°C, causing havoc on essential healthcare services due to a huge influx of patients experiencing heat-related health conditions. These heatwaves have also caused many school closures, preventing children access to important education. Both quality education and healthcare costs money, deciding to access private healthcare when services are stretched or to buy technology for online learning is not a cost that people of lower socio-economic status can afford. Additionally, poorer parts of cities have been identified as heat hotspots due to a lack of vegetation and other heat-relieving infrastructure, because of their high building and maintenance costs.
Mr Law explained that some people have found that on hot days going to shopping malls was a low-cost way to access cool air-conditioned space. This emphasised the importance of building public spaces people of all socio-economic status can access.
As discussions at this year’s COP revolve strongly around climate finance, we must not forget the human dimension of accelerating heat. People around the world directly experience the consequences of climate change so we need to make sure our services and infrastructure provide resilience to the people living in our cities.