Further I deg C warming endangers 800m outdoor workers: Study

It will take only 1 deg C of further global warming for intense, humid heat to endanger the health and imperil the livelihoods of hundreds of millions of outdoor workers in the tropics, a United States-led study has found.

- Shabana Begum

The planet has already become hotter by about 1.1 deg C on average since pre-industrial times.

And if that extra warming by a single deg C happens, about 800 million people in the tropics will be living in areas where heavy physical work becomes dangerous for more than half the hours in a year, according to a review paper published in early March in the Cell Press journal One Earth.

The 2023 United Nations climate change conference warned that the world had not done enough to keep global warming to 1.5 deg C from pre-industrial times – a landmark goal under the Paris Agreement.

“Over a billion outdoor workers live in the tropics, where nearly a fifth of all hours in the year are hot and humid enough to exceed recommended safety thresholds for heavily toiling workers,” the report said, warning about rising heat-related illnesses such as heat stroke and chronic kidney disease.

The paper’s authors called for individuals, communities and governments to step up efforts to bolster the heat resilience of outdoor workers in the tropics, including those in agriculture, construction, forestry and fisheries.

They also highlighted research gaps related to outdoor workers in humid heat, including the need for more fieldwork to better measure heat impacts for each outdoor work sector and demographic, since factors such as age, health and working conditions shape each person’s risk of heat strain.

The authors also noted that existing studies rarely delved into solutions, which means workers’ adaptations to heat remain understudied.