The scorching heat is coming, and "death to heat" has gradually become a mantra for everyone, used to complain about the hot weather, but few people want to believe that by 2024, there will be people who will really be "killed by heat".
But the truth is that it will! For India, this is not even an isolated case.
Under the heat wave, many places in India have set new high temperature records in recent days, with the highest temperature exceeding 45°C for many days, and a weather station in the Delhi area even measured an astonishing high temperature of 52.9°C. Later, the weather station urgently clarified that the temperature sensor was malfunctioning, but the actual temperature was also close to 50°C.
The most brutal consequence of the continuous hot weather in India is death.
On June 1, when India's general election was in full swing, 33 election workers, including several officials, died of heat stroke.
▲ The election officials were killed by heat, which may also be a kind of physical screening
In addition to this, at least 85 people died on the day from diseases that may have been associated with the heat in places like Odisha, Bihar, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh in India.
According to official statistics, the cumulative number of deaths caused by high temperatures for several consecutive days exceeded 200. But the Indian media estimated that the real data may be even more.
Not only this year, but almost every year when a heat wave hits, hundreds or thousands of people die in India due to heat.
In June 2023, hot weather caused 170 deaths in India in a matter of days.
In March 2022, the heatwave that swept through India and Pakistan killed at least 90 people in both countries.
The 2015 heatwave in India claimed the lives of 500 Indians in just one week, and more than 2,000 people died of heat throughout the year.
So why do so many people die of heat in India every year?
Indian "Stove"
This has to start with the geography of India, which has a typical tropical monsoon climate. Therefore, for Indians, there is no distinction between spring, summer, autumn and winter, the whole year is divided into dry season, rainy season and cool season, the dry season is from March to May every year, the rainy season is from June to October, and the cool season is from October to February.
Due to its vast size, the time of the season varies slightly depending on the latitude of different parts of India. Generally speaking, around March every year, the temperature in India gradually rises as the angle of the sun gradually rises and the hours of sunshine increase, symbolizing the beginning of the dry season.
For most parts of China, April and May are the most comfortable months of the year, and many families are busy planning where to go for spring travel.
The temperature in the interior of India is already in the 40s Celsius by this time, and it is not surprising to Indians that this is not surprising.
▲The northwest region of India is a desert, and there are Himalayan mountains in the north
Since it is called the monsoon climate, the monsoon naturally plays a crucial role in India's climate. From June to September, the monsoon brings about 70% of India's annual rainfall, and India's agriculture depends on this rainy season.
But before the rainy season arrives, the people of India will have the most difficult period.
From late May to early June every year, under the action of high pressure over India, the sky is cloudy, the precipitation is less, the solar radiation is strong, the land is dry and hard, and the inland areas of India are hot and humid with the air sinking and heating in the high pressure and the dry and hot wind blowing from the northwest desert region.
In the north, the Himalayas, known as the "Roof of the World" and "Protector Mountains", block the cold air from high latitudes.
Even if some northerly winds blow from the side of the mountain range, as the temperature rises and the humidity decreases, it will eventually form a "fire wind", which is dry and hot.
So much so that the whole of India is like a big furnace that has been erected by nature.
▲The whole of India is in high temperatures
Under the influence of multiple factors, the temperature in the inland areas of south-central India was unusually high during this time, reaching a maximum of about 60 degrees Celsius, and quickly spread into a "heat wave" that swept across India.
High temperatures affect every aspect of India
Heat waves are a frequent visitor to India, although the duration, scope and impact of each heat wave are different, but it is certain that the long-term drought and high temperature weather caused by heat waves have affected all aspects of the production and life of Indian people.
First of all, there is a shortage of water, and the water situation in India is really drought, drought, and waterlogging. During the rainy season, flooding is severe; During the dry season, there is not a drop of small rivers and ponds left in the suburbs of the west and inland. So much so that local villagers had to run several kilometers away to find water in order to drink water.
▲ Indian residents queuing up to receive water
In urban areas, water supply is also scarce. Even if you live in the New Delhi area of India's capital, you have to queue up on time to get water. In the process of queuing, in order to compete for water supply, pushing and fighting incidents occur from time to time.
It is difficult for people to find water, not to mention the livestock and wild animals that people raise, and there are not a few animals that "fall asleep" in the wild.
▲45-minute cardiopulmonary resuscitation...... The monkey carcasses were cold
In order to survive, the animals also had to take risks.
According to Indian media reports, during this year's heat wave, the lakes in northern India dried up, and dozens of monkeys jumped into wells to drink water to quench their thirst, only to climb out and drown.
Even mosquitoes say that the living environment in India is extremely harsh. The most suitable temperature for mosquitoes to survive is between 22°C and 32°C, and the low temperature environment and high temperature environment above 40°C are enough to kill it, and it is difficult to find a live mosquito in India when the temperature reaches almost 50°C in the dry season.
▲ Related reports
In the case of water shortage, young people can still carry it, but it is not so easy for people who are old or have diseases, and the penetration rate of air conditioning in India is not high, and the vast majority of ordinary families cannot afford to buy air conditioners, even electric fans, and India often has power outages, and fans cannot be used. This is also a major cause of casualties in India during the dry season.
In the face of drought, even the various religions in India, which are constantly conflicted and frictional, have rarely united, whether it is Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, etc., they have put aside their prejudices and prayed to the gods for the early arrival of the monsoon to bring people a hearty rain.
▲ Hindu rain prayer ceremony, soaked in a bucket
From a production point of view, abnormally high temperatures will also lead to a decrease in production efficiency. Research from the University of Cambridge shows that extreme heat could eventually lead to a 15% reduction in Indians' "ability to work outdoors" by 2050 and a 2.8% loss of GDP, with a loss of 8.7% of GDP by 2100.
Extreme heat with temperatures close to 50°C has turned outdoor work into a "high-risk job", increasing the risk of heat stroke for every extra minute spent outdoors by construction workers, rickshaw drivers and farmers.
If it is not treated in time, it may cause liver, heart, kidney and other organ failure, permanent brain damage and even death.
According to foreign media reports, from March to May this year, there were 25,000 cases of heat stroke in India, resulting in at least 56 deaths, and in June, it was even hotter, and the death toll skyrocketed.
On the day of India's general election on June 1 this year, 33 Indian workers in charge of election affairs died of heat stroke because they were in charge of the election activities for a long time and did not receive timely and appropriate medical treatment after suffering from heat stroke.
▲If it exceeds 40°C, you should not engage in outdoor activities
For Indian agriculture, which depends on the weather, hot weather has the most direct blow, especially for wheat, which is more sensitive to temperature.
According to research, every 1°C increase in global average temperature will reduce wheat production by about 6.0%. Wheat, on the other hand, is the second largest food crop in India after rice.
In India, only one crop of wheat is grown a year, sown in October and November during the cool season, and harvested in March of the following year. March is the alternation of the cool and dry seasons, and the temperature of the month is crucial for the wheat harvest.
But it always backfired, and around March 2022, a heat wave swept through India earlier than usual, and the unusually high temperatures directly led to heat stress in wheat, which plummeted by nearly 11 million tons that year.
In order to curb inflation, India had to ban wheat exports that year, which in turn led to higher prices in the international wheat market.
India's production of cash crops such as sugarcane and cotton has also been affected and reduced. In addition, the subsequent economic losses of the industrial chain are even more serious.
Earlier, in 2016, a devastating drought struck India, and 9 million farmers in Maharashtra, one of the hardest hit areas, had no access to water, and 216 farmers committed suicide under pressure.
The lack of irrigation water due to drought, heat stress caused by high temperatures, and frequent flooding during the rainy season can only be said to be too difficult for Indian farmers.
If you don't have any psychological quality, you can't be a farmer in India. Under the long-term high pressure of survival, it is not difficult to understand the peasant uprisings that broke out in India from time to time.
▲ Indian peasant uprising in 2020
Drought leads to water shortage, outdoor high-temperature work will cause heat stroke death, or can't bear the pressure to commit suicide, if the dry season to prepare the water source and honestly stay at home to blow the air conditioner and lie flat, it's always okay, right? Not necessarily.
How Indians cool down
According to statistics, in 2022, there will be 123.6 air conditioners per 100 households in the mainland, that is, an average of 1.2 air conditioners per family.
For most families in China, eating watermelon in an air-conditioned room in the summer is normal, but for Indians, this is not the case.
Against the backdrop of a global average of 30% air conditioning penetration, India's domestic air conditioning penetration rate is even less than 6%, especially in rural areas in remote areas. The whole village couldn't get an air conditioner, which was a common thing.
In order to escape the heat, ordinary Indians are racking their brains and wits, and the more common ones are terracotta pots and straw coolers.
The function of the terracotta pot is similar to that of a refrigerator for the average Indian, if there is no refrigerator at home, the drinking water is left in the clay pot for a few hours, and the water is cooled before drinking. Therefore, terracotta pots are a must-have item in almost every household in India.
A company in Delhi even used the characteristics of clay to design terracotta tile door curtains, pouring water on the terracotta tiles when the weather is hot, and according to the principle of evaporative heat absorption, the hot air of the terracotta tiles can be cooled, thereby reducing the indoor temperature.
▲ India's terracotta curtain door
As for the straw cooling fan, it is relatively more "advanced", at least it uses electricity, but the basic principle is similar to that of terracotta curtains.
There is a water tank at the bottom of the cooler, and the shell is covered with straw on three sides, and the water in the water tank is pumped out and hit on the straw, and the hot air is cooled down after passing through the wet straw, and then blown out by the fan to help people cool down.
▲Straw cooler
But it is clear that these methods can only be said to be better than nothing.
Especially in arid regions, where people in India struggle to secure access to drinking water, how can they spend precious water resources on cooling.
▲ Is there no idiom in India such as "Yugong moves mountains, Dayu controls water"? In 40 years, you locals haven't thought of a way to solve the problem of water scarcity.
▲In 1956, more than 60 villagers dug an 8-kilometer-long canal on the mountain to solve the water problem.
▲Tuanjie Village, Zunyi, Guizhou Province has no water source and is blocked by mountains, and the old branch secretary led the villagers to dig a 10-kilometer-long "heavenly" canal on the cliff.
And more extreme, rough, and primitive ways to cool down the heat are not without it, such as soaking in the Ganges River to cool down.
It can only be said that the Ganges River in India has endured too much in this life.
▲ Men, women and children on the banks of the Ganges
For wealthy Indian families who have installed air conditioning, the situation is not much better, after all, it may not be necessary to install it.
Power outages are a normal part of India's life, and in the words of the locals, "occasional power supply can break the peaceful life of Indians".
Almost every year, we see news of massive power outages in various parts of India, and there are many factors behind this problem.
From the perspective of power supply, the overall power supply structure is too dependent on coal power generation, the power infrastructure is seriously aging, the technology is backward, and the national power supply lacks unified dispatching.
On the demand side, the huge population base dictates the strong demand for electricity, and with the Modi government's "Make in India" initiative, the demand for industrial electricity has increased significantly. The rainy and cool seasons are relatively suitable, but in the dry season, the lack of water also seriously affects hydropower generation, and residents' electricity consumption surges.
▲ There are still 200 million people in rural India who do not have access to electricity
Looking at it this way, it is not always so satisfying for the inhabitants of India, no matter which way they take to cool off the heat.
Climate change threatens to exacerbate this dilemma
What makes the Indian people even more uncomfortable is that with global climate change, a series of problems caused by unusually hot weather in the dry season may be exacerbated.
Over the past 10 years, the weather in India has become hotter and hotter from March to May. India's dry season is on average arriving earlier and longer, while the unusually hot weather due to climate change is longer, more frequent and more intense.
A study by the Indian Institute of Technology shows that between 1951 and 2010, the frequency of extreme temperatures in India increased significantly, as did the duration of the hot season, adding three days almost every decade.
It is foreseeable that the life of the Indian people in the dry season will become more and more difficult in the future.
Finally, when the heat is coming, I also hope that friends who travel or work outdoors will be prepared for heatstroke, and if you feel unwell, please rest or seek medical attention in time.