Is Human-Induced Climate Change Making Heat Waves Worse?
Summary from the AllSides News Team
Is human-induced climate change exacerbating heat waves in the United States?
For Context: Earlier this week, The National Weather Service warned that the Midwest and Eastern U.S. could experience a heat wave “notable and potentially the longest experienced in decades for some locations.”
Details: A new report from the World Weather Attribution concluded that recent heat waves endured throughout the United States and Central America were made 35 times worse due to human-induced climate change. Another report from ScienceAlert stated, “Heat related deaths are rising as heat waves like this one occur more regularly thanks to worsening human-induced climate change. Extreme heat events are also increasing in their intensity and duration, bringing along greater fire danger too.”
Key Quotes: Friederike Otto, co-author of the World Weather Attribution study, stated, “Unsurprisingly, heatwaves are getting deadlier … we’ve known about the dangers of climate change at least since the 1970s. But thanks to spineless politicians, who give in to fossil-fuel lobbying again and again, the world continues to burn huge amounts of oil, gas and coal.”
How the Media Covered It: The reports were barely covered in right-rated outlets. Breitbart (Right bias) covered one report, labeling the scientists “alarmists” and countering one report’s claim that “the leading weather-related deaths in the US are caused by heat” by stating, “The group’s assertion that in the U.S. most weather-related deaths ‘are caused by heat’ does not stand up to scrutiny, however, since the majority of weather-related deaths come from cold, not heat.”
Featured Coverage of this Story
From the Left
Deadly heat in Mexico and US made 35 times more likely by global heating
The deadly heatwave that scorched large swaths of Mexico, Central America and the southern US in recent weeks was made 35 times more likely due to human-induced global heating, according to research by leading climate scientists from World Weather Attribution (WWA).
Tens of millions of people have endured dangerous day – and nighttime temperatures as a heat dome engulfed Mexico – a large and lingering zone of high pressure that stretched north to Texas, Arizona and Nevada, and south over Belize, Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador.
A heatwave can be...
From the Center
Climate change made US and Mexico heatwave 35 times more likely
Human-induced climate change made recent extreme heat in the US south-west, Mexico and Central America around 35 times more likely, scientists say.
The World Weather Attribution (WWA) group studied excess heat between May and early June, when the US heatwave was concentrated in south-west states including California, Nevada and Arizona.
Extreme temperatures in Mexico also claimed lives during the period.
Such attribution studies take some time to complete, so it is too soon for scientists to say how much of a role climate change is playing in the current heatwave...
From the Right
Alarmists Warn of ‘Heat Dome’ over U.S. Tied to Human-Induced Climate Change
Science Alert warned Monday “worsening human-induced climate change” is contributing to an increase in heat-related deaths as the United States languishes under a “heat dome.”
“Despite being preventable, the leading weather-related deaths in the US are caused by heat,” the article states, adding that heat-related deaths “are rising as heat waves like this one occur more regularly thanks to worsening human-induced climate change.”
“Extreme heat events are also increasing in their intensity and duration, bringing along greater fire danger too,” it contends, arguing that “millions are at risk” from the...
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