In 2003 (see map below), 14,802
people died of hyperthermia in
France and an estimated 70,000 similarly succumbed across Europe. My husband was in Italy that June and says he has never experienced anything even close to it. Since June of this year, 78 people
in Washington and 116 people in Oregon have died from heat-related causes. With record temperatures throughout the southwestern United States and the Pacific Northwest in June and July as reported by
CNN,
there were undoubtedly even more unreported heat-related deaths. According to the Washington Post, authorities in Oregon, Washington, and western Canada are investigating more than 800 deaths potentially linked to the extreme heat. For more details on the recent heat wave, see this article in the New York
Times.
HOW HEAT KILLS.
Scientific American describes how hyperthermia, better known as heat stroke, kills. [WARNING: This is gruesome.]
The first phase is heat exhaustion, a condition marked by heavy sweat, nausea, vomiting and even fainting. The pulse races, and the skin goes clammy. Muscle cramping can be an early sign….
Heat exhaustion can be reversed by moving to a cool location, loosening clothing and applying cool, wet washcloths to the body. But when people with heat exhaustion can't find relief, they can quickly advance to heat stroke. This condition happens when a person's core body temperature rises above 104 degrees F (40 degrees C). (This number is something of an estimate; there are a few degrees' variability among people as to how much internal heat they can tolerate.)
In heat stroke, sweating stops and the skin becomes dry and flushed. The pulse is rapid. The person becomes delirious and may pass out. When trying to compensate for extreme heat, the body dilates the blood vessels in the skin in an attempt to cool the blood. To do this, the body has to constrict the blood vessels in the gut. The reduced blood flow to the gut increases the permeability between the cells that normally keep gut contents in, and toxins can leak into the blood….
These leaky toxins trigger a massive inflammatory response in the body, so massive that the attempt to fight off the toxins damages the body's own tissues and organs. … Muscle cells break down, spilling their contents into the bloodstream and overloading the kidneys, which in turn start to fail, a condition called rhabdomyolysis.
Proteins in the spleen start to clump as a direct result of heat; they're essentially cooked. The blood-brain barrier that normally keeps pathogens out of the brain becomes more permeable, allowing dangerous substances into the brain. Autopsies of people killed by heat stroke often reveal microhemorrhages (tiny strokes) and swelling, and 30 percent of heat stroke survivors experience permanent damage in brain function….
WHO IS GETTING KILLED.
Humans aren’t the only living things that succumb to extreme heat.
- An estimated billion bivalves cooked in their shells on the shores of the Pacific Northwest last week, not only making the beach uninhabitable, but also obliterating the animals’ beneficial cleaning of seawater by taking in phytoplankton, micro-particulates, and pollutants. New York Times
- Fruit –including 50% to 70% of cherry crops in British Columbia--actually cooked on the trees. CBC
- 212,000 acres of forest in Oregon went up in the flames of the Bootleg Fire (top), which now threatens California’s power supply = bye bye air conditioning, hello hyperthermia. Washington Post
- The Beckwourth Fire (below) north of Lake Tahoe on the California-Nevada border, only 23% contained, has already burned 95,747 acres, killing carbon-trapping trees and unknown numbers of wildlife, raising the tally in the Sixth Mass Extinction. Mercury News
Need a drink? That could become problematical. Between 2018 and 2020, California vineyards in Napa and Sonoma counties whose vines were destroyed by fire or whose vintages were damaged by smoke have either seen their 2021 fire insurance premiums quadruple or been denied coverage altogether, putting their financing and futures in jeopardy. SF Chronicle
WHY ARE WE GETTING KILLED?
It’s the climate change, stupid!
According to an analysis by an international team of climate researchers cited in the New York Times, the heat dome event that scorched the Pacific Northwest would not have occurred without global warming.
“Although it was a rare event, it would have been virtually impossible without climate change,” said Geert Jan van Oldenborgh of the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute, who conducted the study with 26 other scientists, part of a collaborative group called World Weather Attribution.
If the world warms another 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit, which could occur this century barring drastic cuts in greenhouse-gas emissions, similar events would not be so rare, the researchers found. The chances of such a severe heat wave occurring somewhere in the world would increase to as much as 20 percent in a given year.
THE CONNECTION BETWEEN KILLER HEAT AND A HOT MIKE.
As the world burns, petro-companies like ExxonMobil are fiddling with our future. Two lobbyists for Exxon recently detailed to an undercover reporter for Unearthed (part of Greenpeace), Exxon’s double-dealing strategy on climate legislation. This is so deliciously evil, you really should read the entire piece from The Guardian:
Keith McCoy, a senior director in Exxon’s Washington government affairs team, was recorded on video in May saying that the company backs a carbon tax “as an easy talking point” and an “advocacy tool” because “there is not an appetite for a carbon tax” and that Republican legislators who oppose taxes in principle will never let it happen.
“Nobody is going to propose a tax on all Americans, and the cynical side of me says, yeah, we kind of know that – but it gives us a talking point that we can say, well, what is ExxonMobil for? Well, we’re for a carbon tax,” he said.
Later, McCoy reiterates the point: “Carbon tax is not going to happen.”
“Did we aggressively fight against some of the science? Yes,” he said. “Did we join some of these shadow groups to work against some of the early efforts? Yes that’s true. But there’s nothing illegal about that. We were looking out for our investments, we were looking out for shareholders.”
Although Exxon is not so overtly denying climate science any more, McCoy acknowledged that it continues to work to undermine environmental regulations and policies to combat global heating.
McCoy
said the oil giant was particularly concerned that Biden’s infrastructure and
environmental plans would be paid for by undoing Trump’s corporate tax cuts
which Easley [the other Exxon lobbyist] described as “probably worth billions
to Exxon”. [Emphasis added.]
Easley said that the oil and gas industry was also lobbying against other environmental measures such as “requirements for the federal government to purchase green energy and renewable technologies and retrofitting federal buildings” that a future Republican administration would not be able to reverse.
“It’s gonna accelerate the transition to the extent that I think four years from now it’s going to be difficult to unwind that,” he said.
STOP! YOU'RE KILLING ME.
Seattle’s chief public health officer, referring to the recent heat wave, put it bluntly: “Climate change is a health emergency. And reducing greenhouse gas emissions is literally a matter of life and death.”
But as the ExxonMobil lobbyists caught on tape made clear, emitting those greenhouse gases is literally a matter of profit. They are not only not listening to the climate science, they are actively working to bury it. Rather than turning down the heat and accelerating a transition to alternative sources of energy, Exxon prefers its own brand of accelerant: ExxonMobil gasoline pored directly onto a burning forest. Keep on fiddling until you get it lit, boys!
Keep it real! And wear your damn mask indoors, even if you’re fully vaccinated.
Marilyn
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