Your Health and a Changing Climate: Newsletter - Volume 6, January 2008

The Summer of 2007 - A Summer of Heat

Heat Wave in Western North America

The 2007 heat wave in western North America began in late June 2007. The next three weeks saw the region experience record setting temperatures in many instances. For example, Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming experienced their hottest July on record.¹ Within western Canada, numerous cities set daily records for recorded highs: Edmonton (32°C - July 5), Medicine Hat (37.9°C - July 6), and Regina (37.2°C - July 6).²

European Heat Wave

South-eastern and central Europe was hit this past June and July by a brutal heat wave. Temperatures in Greece exceeded 40°C for seven straight days during the end of June.

This resulted in the country's energy infrastructure buckling under the combined strain of skyrocketing demand and the record high temperatures exceeding the physical parameters of physical infrastructure (e.g., transformers exploding, underground transmission cables melting). Forest fires raged across Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia, Montenegro, Greece, Albania, and Italy. Preliminary estimates from Hungary, one of the harder hit countries, suggests that eight days of +40°C heat has resulted in more than 500 deaths,³ and there have been suggestions that these figures under-estimate the true extent of heat mortality in the country.

Meteorologists believe that the heat wave is the result of an unusual southern shift in the jet stream over Europe, which may be the result of the 'La Nina' effect. The shift has resulted in warmer air from northern Africa being pulled north, sweeping over southeast Europe.

Heat Wave in South Asia

The 2007 South Asia Heat Waves affected the countries of Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Nepal, Russia, and China.

Approximately 400 people have died from sunstroke and dehydration in a month-long heat wave sweeping India, Nepal, Pakistan and Bangla - desh. Among the worst hit regions was Orissa, an eastern state in India, where 100 people died from heat.⁴ Temperatures in the region hit 50°C over a month long heat wave that started in late May. In Russia, a new record was set for Moscow where temperatures in May proved to be the hottest in over 100 years.⁵