Hottest day of the year: comment

“Government national security advisors warned early this year that impacts from climate change and biodiversity loss pose a threat to UK national security and prosperity [2]. As we continue to break heat records, our country is turning into a parched, brown landscape as we run short of water, with farmers facing possibly the worst harvest on record [3]. Firefighters have been called to more than 1,000 wildfires this year, and nurses struggle in overheating hospitals, with rising numbers of patients as extreme heat harms our health. 2,877 people already lost their lives in the May and June heatwaves [4]; 1,100 of them only because of the extra heat added by human-caused climate change [5].

"The science clearly shows that this only gets worse, and more dangerous, until we cut our emissions from burning oil and gas to net zero - the only solution we have to bring our climate back into balance, and avoid this exceptionally hot summer being one of the coolest of the rest of our lives. Questions are now being raised about the new Government’s broader response to climate change.”.