145 million Indian children face extra month of heat stress due to climate change: Study

Climate change exposes 145 million Indian children to at least one additional month of heat stress annually, a study has found. Researchers warned that the figure could rise to 169 million under 2 degrees Celsius of global warming

New Delhi: In India, 61 per cent of children, or 145 million, are exposed to at least one additional month of heat stress due to climate change every year, new global research has estimated.

Findings published in the journal Science Advances show that climate change has doubled the number of children aged up to nine exposed to at least five total months of dangerous heat stress per year — from 59 million to 118 million (50 per cent of children).

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An international team of researchers, led by those at Vrije Universiteit Brussel in Belgium, said the study is the first-ever analysis quantifying how heat exposure directly linked to climate change affects different age groups globally, both now and in the near future.

Excess heat disrupts the human body’s normal functioning, aggravates underlying diseases, and can lead to serious complications such as heatstroke, dehydration, and organ failure.

The study focuses on humid heat, which is more dangerous than dry heat because it impedes the body’s ability to sweat to cool back down, leading to dangerous levels of heat stress.

Globally, up to 560 million children aged 0-9 — 43 per cent of all children in this age group — are living through at least one additional month of heat stress per year due to human-induced climate change, the analysis found.

The exposure outpaces that for any other age group and is nearly triple the 190 million people (30 per cent) aged 60-69 experiencing the additional health threat, the researchers said.

They added climate change is increasing humid heat the most in tropical regions and poorer countries, where populations are younger, and more children are therefore affected.

South Asia, Southeast Asia, and West Africa are the regions with the highest number of children exposed to dangerous heat stress today, the team said.

“Climate change is already causing hundreds of millions of children to suffer from dangerous heat worldwide, posing severe risks to their health. Children in developing countries face (a) disproportionate exposure to climate extremes now and into the future, despite contributing the least to historical greenhouse gas emissions,” lead author Rosa Pietroiusti, a PhD researcher at Vrije Universiteit Brussel, said.

“At the same time, poverty, inadequate housing, limited access to cooling, and overstretched health care systems leave many children with few ways to protect themselves from the heat,” Pietroiusti said.

The number of children affected by an additional month of dangerous heat is expected to increase to 620 million (49 per cent of all children) and 650 million (59 per cent) children under projected climate change scenarios of 1.5 degrees Celsius and 2 degrees Celsius of global warming, respectively.

In India, 166 million children (74 per cent) are projected to experience at least one additional month of heat stress per year under a global warming of 1.5 degrees Celsius.

The figure could be 169 million children (96 per cent) under a global warming of 2 degrees Celsius.