European heat wave

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I just read on cnn.com that over 3,000 people in France have died from the heat. Now being an "Ugly American" that sounds outrageous to me. Is air conditioning only popular in the States? How is it possible that people don't know how to escape the heat?

 

I heard of temperatures up to 49C degrees is extreme, and it is outrageous. Those people have probably been caught by surprise and not listened properly to the signals of their bodies. As with air conditioning, many places they have shut down power supply because people excessively use them.

You could basicly fry eggs on the black pavement, so it's hot.

 

It has reached some really hot temperatures here in England recently, we are simply not used to such extreme heat over here. An overcast day is usually celebrated, never mind 40+ degree heat .

Thankfully, the heat wave is now subsiding somewhat, and i can finally revert back to my jumper and trousers, rather than shorts and t-shirt, heh. And no, A/C isnt really popular in household over here as yet. Simply, we haven't need for them 99% of the time, and the 1% simply doesn't necessitate the costs of A/C.

Can't say that i haven't got something of a tan from it though

 

Actually, one of the rebukes which were made versus the French authorities was, not having cared about the Chicago heat-wave disaster from 1995. Indeed, a lot of European cities have no accurate emergency plan in place, for a heat-emergency. Something which propably become more and more important in the future.

Obviously, a big part of Europe is shelterd by the wonderful atlantic climate. Therefore, I don't see that air conditioning will ever be as popular over here, as way down south in the states.

A lot of people can't escape the heat.

Acutally, as we had (and still have) a heat-wave too, there's a lot of discussion going on, that we better loosen-up American style and change our behaviour a little bit and let old customs drop -> Allowing Short-trousers would be the first thing !

 

I don't know anybody here in Holland who has air conditioning in their own house. I'm getting air cooling next year (it just cools with cold air for a few degrees, it can't bring the entire house temperature down to freezing point), but not many people have those either.

 

When temperatures reach 50 C like in Madrid, there's simply no escape from the heat. But i know i won't be fooled next year, i'm gonna get me an AC, it's well worth it to spend 300 or 400 Euro on. I never wanna go through a summer like this again without airco.

 

I hear your man.

When the little snook was born 7 years ago we hired a contractor to cut some holes in the walls and install some hefty units. I wish we had had the money for central air conditioning, but that was going to run around $6,000. Still the $2,000 has been money well spent. Here in the northeast U.S. it has been in the 90s (that's farenheit not celsius) and humid for so long that I'm not sure what it was like to not hear the hum of the air conditioners going.

I have some followup questions. Tal mentioned mentioned people are unable to work in air conditioning. Have the deaths been work related or were they at home or a combination of both? Do european cars have air conditioning? I ask for I know they do in the models they sell over here.

 

@Snook

Old people that could not handle the heat died.
People caught in forest fires died.
People with general poor health died.
People who went swimming to get out of the heat didn't die, not until they drowned.
People that did not understand heatstroke and dehydration died.
Most of all, people for whom it was their time to die, died.

Its just a long list of predictable cause and effect situations, and then you hear about the toddler that was left in the car with windows up...

The heatwave passes and we all forget, because we choose to forget. We spend our money on living, not on precautions to ensure we stay alive, because no matter how much you spend you cannot change the fact that we are all born to die.

Its not down to Europeans being strangers to high temperatures. Look in your own back yard, in your own recent past, and ask yourself what has changed, and what could actually be changed if the political will was there.

http://www.wsws.org/news/1998/july1998/heat-j23.shtml

That is a very biased article (damn Commies, where's my nuke) but I think it hits on a good point. Europe has usually just got the threat of very cold winters to deal with. If the temperature falls below freezing for a prolonged amount of time, the British Government pays out an extra cold weather allowance to pensioners to ensure they can afford to turn their heating on.

If the same scheme was applied for extrordinarily hot weather, in countries where it is a known killer, then people on low incomes would be able to take additional steps to stay cool.

Where does the money come from? The additional utility profits made because of the heat wave would be an obvious target, but I can't see that happening. Its a health issue, and the funds have to come from the Health Services Provider's budget.

I don't understand the how the American Health Service works, but with an uneducated guess I would say that its low income families that can't afford health insurance, so when a family member gets sick from something as unthreatening as heat stroke, they aren't rushed to hospital, they are just left to get over it, and they die. Is this too simplistic a view? If it is not then how could funds be channeled to stop this scenario from occuring?

 

150 years record ! Or, never been so hot since they measure temperature. quotes

Blame Africa !

Atlantic Ocean, save us !

 

@gollem

Our health care system for the poor is very strange. The majority of the poor do not have health insurance. However, all hospitals are required to give free care if a patient's income is below a certain threshold. What this typically means is that the poor do not receive any health care until they are very sick and need to go to the emergency room. The people with health care would have seen a private doctor earlier and gotten quicker treatment.

@Tal

Can you run for me some stats? I'm curious how many members of SP are younger than your car?
I would also like to see some photos

 

Tal's car is almost as old as he is!
But seriously, Tal, with the money you're raking in from this site, you should be able to afford a brand new Mercedes!

Anyway, today it's supposed to be in the high 30's (Celsius). Pretty darn hot for here; my igloo is in danger of melting!

 

It was 102F here today. But that's only a little higher than normal. TGS - Since you mention our heatlhcare system (or lack of it) I will only add that we agree: It is very strange.

 

Today's the fourth day after 21 or 22 days of continouos daily average temperatures well above 30° C, peaking with a few days reaching 40° C with approx 75+ % humidity.
After the three weeks we had an average indoor temperature of 25° C ...

Today it's humid and cool, some 15° C; it's raining cats and dogs now and I just got myself dry clothes after returning dripping wet from buying food for the week.

Forecast sais it'll be hot again midweek. Ah well.

 

Air-conditioning has simply never been really needed here. There's a standing joke among us Americans about "enjoying your two weeks of summer" here - which should give you an idea just how much cooler the European summers (excluding southern Europe, of course) are than in the US. Since this was a DRY heat (we're actually experiencing a drought) - I believe what is happening is that people are not realising they're becoming overly dehydrated until too late, and the emergency services are being overwhelmed. I've had first-hand experience with heat-exhaustion, so I've been pushing the water for my family to avoid trouble. Now, it's cooled down a bit, so it's more tolerable.

 

Strange climate for most European countries. Too strange might i say for countries that are so up north. But when all the enviromental organizations are talking about the disaster we are causing to our planet the industries and worst the goverments of this world play the role of Pontius Pilatus, while they are responsible with their actions or lack of actions.