Almost every child on Earth will be affected by heat waves by 2050 — UN

Photo by: epastor16 / iStock

At least 500 million young people around the world are suffering from heat waves today, and by 2050 this figure will rise to 2 billion, which means that the majority of children on Earth will be exposed to elevated temperatures. This is stated in the report of the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), according to the press service of the UN.

Children in the Earth’s northern regions will face the steepest heatwaves, and by mid-century nearly half of all minors in Africa and Asia will be exposed to sustained temperatures above 35 °C, the foundation said.

“The climate crisis is a crisis of children’s rights, and it is already having a devastating impact on children’s lives and futures,” UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell stressed.

The fund manager added that this year alone, young people in India, Europe and North America have been affected by wildfires, heat waves and other climate disasters.

According to UNICEF, young children are at particular risk when faced with extreme heat, as their bodies are less able to cope with temperature regulation.

The more often minors are exposed to high temperatures, the more likely they are to develop chronic respiratory disease, asthma and cardiovascular disease in the future.

UNICEF believes that countries around the world urgently need to invest in increasing their resilience and adapting all the systems on which children’s safety and well-being in the face of climate change depend.

Protecting children from the increasing impact of heat waves should be a priority for all nations, experts say.

UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador and climate activist Vanessa Nakate added that children, who are least responsible for climate change, are most affected.

Earlier in 2022, the UN Convention to Combat Desertification released data showing that from 1970 to 2019, weather, climate and water factors accounted for half of natural disasters and 45% of human deaths — mostly in developing countries.

During this period, droughts accounted for just 15% of natural disasters. But it is these that have caused the greatest loss of life, with some 650 000 deaths due to drought. The drying up of soils has caused considerable damage to the global economy. From 1998 to 2017, droughts caused a loss of about $124 billion. Today, more than 2.3 billion people on the planet, including 160 million children, suffer from water scarcity.

Cover photo: Stefano Barzellotti / iStock