Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria : Today’s number is about… heat waves

According to a University of Hawaii study (Manoa, U.S.) published in Nature Climate Change, 30% of the world's population is currently exposed to potentially mortal heat for 20 or more days per year. The study also found that if CO2 emissions are not drastically reduced, 74% of the global population will be exposed to lethal heat events. The study suggests that it is practically inevitable that excessive heat will pose a threat to human life.

To conduct the research scientists reviewed 911 studies published between 1980 and 2014, with data from cities or regions where human deaths were associated with high temperatures. As reported in El Mundo, the authors found 783 cases with increase heat-related mortality in 164 cities in 36 countries.

In Chicago, in 1993, a heat wave killed more than 700 people in five days. In Paris, in 2003, nearly 2,000 people died. In Moscow, in 2010, approximately 5,000 passed away. They are just a few examples that indicate that lethal heat waves are already fairly frequent in many cities around the planet.