India faces rising uncompensable heat stress, especially during monsoon season
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As global warming continues apace and politicians do little to address the warming crisis, the consequences are hitting home: at least 25,000 excess deaths in Europe in summer 2026, more than 200,000 heat-related deaths in Europe since 2022 and over 30,000 excess deaths this summer in India over a five-day period in which temperatures exceeded 45°C (113°F).
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During UHS, the human body struggles to cool down because of extreme heat and high humidity or simply cannot cool down sufficiently to prevent major bodily harm. (This is true not only for the elderly but also for young, healthy children and adults.) Heat with high humidity is especially dangerous.
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To assess extreme heat and uncompensable heat stress in humans, the authors created a physiological metric and considered a critical threshold "derived from experiments performed on young, healthy, and optimally hydrated adults from North America, and as such it may not accurately represent the heat tolerance of South Asian populations. Differences in future population growth and ages were not considered, nor were future technology installations that might provide some adaptation capabilities."
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In the observed baseline period of 1979 to 2021, UHS affected about 9% of India's population, with days of extreme concern ranging from one to 15 per year. The area where UHS is an issue quadrupled, rising from 10,000 square kilometers (3,900 square miles) during the 1980s to 40,000 square kilometers (15,400 square miles) by 2020. Under 2.0°C of global warming, the area of India projected to have UHS during summer is an astonishing 63% of the country, and 53% during the monsoon season.
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