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Poorest people will suffer worst from cities’ heat
(Climate News Network, 9 Mar 2021) As ever, the poorest people will most feel the heat in a hotter world. But a green growth initiative could help them.
As the summer thermometer soars, and the cities of the US Southwest are caught up in extremes of heat, the poorest people who live in the least prosperous districts may find their streets as much as 3°C hotter than those of the wealthiest 10%.
And in Los Angeles, one of the richest cities in one of the richest states of the world’s richest nation, citizens in the most heavily Latin-American districts could be as much as 3.7°C hotter than their white, well-heeled neighbours.
Excess heat is linked to heat stroke, exhaustion, respiratory and cardiovascular problems and of course death: one US group has identified 27 ways in which heat can kill, and several sets of researchers have independently established that potentially lethal heat waves are becoming more likely, more extreme and more widespread.
Californian geographers report in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health that they mapped summer temperatures in 20 urban centres in California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico and Texas.
