Pre-monsoon heatwave in South Asia breaking records due to climate change

• South and Southeast Asia are experiencing another record heatwave, with forecasts anticipating that the heatwave will continue in certain parts of the region before rain or cool winds bring a respite from the heat
• In contrast in April, Western South Asian regions received excessive rainfall, which led to flooding in parts of Pakistan and Afghanistan, killing more than 100 people
• Heat stress events are considered potentially deadly when ‘wet bulb’ temperatures (temperatures that include humidity as a factor) exceed 35°C
• A recent study looked at the Indo-Pakistan heatwave in 2022, showing climate change made it 41% more likely to occur

Dr Fahad Saeed, a scientist from Climate Analytics based in Islamabad, Pakistan said:

“You can see the fingerprints of climate change all over this. Extremes are emerging with torrential rains in some areas of South Asia, and deadly heatwaves in others. The rains would usually bring intermittent relief from the heat for people, but with climate change that’s not happening. So what we’re seeing is these more intense, longer periods of extreme heat.”

“El Niño, which is part of natural weather cycles, is also making this worse this year, but we’ve had El Niño cycles before, and never like this.”

“Poor people without access to electricity for cooling are especially vulnerable to extreme heatwaves. Here we can see a major injustice, as these populations are contributing the least to climate change, but are bearing the brunt of its effects.”

“Governments need to be tackling this issue head on. They need to be moving away from the source of climate change, coal and gas, and installing as much renewable power, as fast as they can.”