India, Pak, China to face heat-induced health issues due to rising temperatures by end of century

By the end of this century, climate change could lead to extreme global warming and trigger health problems such as heart attacks and heat strokes in populous countries including India, China and Pakistan, a study has said.

The study published on Monday (Oct 9) in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found that a significant portion of the world's population will be vulnerable to "moist heat stress" with some devastating consequences on human health if the temperatures rise above 2 degrees Celsius of warming. Notably,till now,the world haswarmed around 1.2 degrees Celsius.

Matthew Huber, co-author of the study and a professor of Earth’s atmospheric and planetary sciences at Purdue University said, "Moist heat stress is a particularly challenging problem, because it affects the human body directly, and causes morbidity and mortality."

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There is a certain threshold combination of heat and humidity that humans can bear, beyond which it causes heat-related health problems such as heat strokes and heart attacks.

The study projected that if the temperatures rise above 2 degrees of warming, then a projected population of 2.2 billion people in Pakistan and the Indus River Valley in India, 1 billion people in China and 800 million people in sub-Saharan Africa will experience hours of heat that will surpass human tolerance by the end of the century.

(Image Credit: PNAS)

In India, the cities that would bear the brunt of this annual heat as per the end-of-century projections for include New Delhi and Kolkata. Globally, cities like Multan and Shanghai will also experience extreme heat conditions.

If global warming continues to go 3 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial levelsby 2100 with no actionstaken, then there will be a sharp increase in the number of people exposed to life-threatening heat and humidity.

Hubersaid, "The worst heat stress will occur in regions that are not wealthy and that are expected to experience rapid population growth in the coming decades."

He added, "This is true despite the fact that these nations generate far fewer greenhouse gas emissions than wealthy nations. As a result, billions of poor people will suffer, and many could die. But wealthy nations will suffer from this heat as well, and in this interconnected world, everyone can expect to be negatively affected in some way."

The experts said that in order to stop the temperatures from increasing, the emission of greenhouse gases, especially carbon dioxide must be reduced.

They warned that if the changes aren't made then developing and underdeveloped countries will suffer the most.

(With inputs from agencies)

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