AIBU to be fed up with the heatwave hysteria?

[Freshtona]

I'm getting a bit sick of the heat hysteria.

Yes it's going to be very hot for the next few days. So stay hydrated and out of the sun. Be sensible, take precautions. It's not difficult.

Millions of people around the world endure hot temperatures and yes it's uncomfortable for these few days but the crap British weather will be back soon, fear not.

People are acting quite over the top about it imo.

Yeah get over it - you can rebuild a burnt house can’t you! And people dying, well there’s too many in the world already right? FFS 🤦🏻‍♀️

😅😂😂

We might complain that it's "a bit hot", but we don't carry on like many on MN do, imagining that half the population will suffer heatstroke and die. We take sensible precautions when it's very hot, we know how to deal with it, and yes, we just get on with life. We don't close things, we don't fly into a panic. I walked to work as usual, people are out and about as usual. We don't wring our hands when the grass dies and the tar melts.

If I had said to my late DM when she was in her 80s that it was going to be 40C tomorrow her reply would have been "Good".

UK homes built to trap heat which leads to genuinely unsafe temps indoors - my bedroom was 40+ come bedtime

UK rails built for cooler climate - our steel buckles in this heat meaning you cant run a train over it or you'l ruin £millions of track

Bridges - ditto. Built for cooler climate and the Expansion joints can come under stress during extreme heat.

Roads - the dual carriageway melted near me, obvs cant keep running cars over it. Their roads are built differently in hotter climates. Colleagues in texas told me they have a lot of concrete roads.

Schools - hardly needs explaining! Buildings that would never have been designed and built in hotter climates.

I'm sure there are more but these are the ones off the top of my head. Most of this stuff was simply designed for a cooler climate when temps of 40+ were genuinely and actually never heard of. As things get rebuilt heatwaves are being taken into account ; the old trains on my line got aircon when they were upgraded for example.

As heatwaves become more frequent, newer projects increasingly take higher temperatures into account, but we cannot retrofit the entire country's anything and everything with all the stuff they use in Texas.

You might think it is hysterical, but i disagree. My friends from South Africa and Texas also disagree with you. They frequently visit and cannot bear UK heatwaves. They say it's unbearable, to which I laugh and say "wait - you live in actual Africa....."

Nice goady uncaring post, @Freshtona

Exactly it's an entirely different type of heat.

People need to read this!

💕
@Britneyfan

You also have rhe heatwave hysteria else you wouldnt be posting angrily about it 😄😄

I am so over hearing about other countries. I said this on another thread, but you get on a bus from any Spanish airport and it's a modern coach with good air-conditioning. Getting on a bus from John Lennon airport or sitting and hour on a bus in Liverpool, is hell. We don't have enough buses, so there's people standing. You go into shops etc across mainland Europe and you cool down because again, they've got good air con. The fields we walked across in 1976 are now housing estates, the trees that gave shade are gone. The area is hotter and because of increased traffic, the air quality is poor. We are in a new build apartment, it's a bloody greenhouse.
@SquirrelGG at the age of 80 there was nowhere your Mother had to be, so her opinion wouldn't be relevant.

Where are people getting hysterical?
I haven’t met anyone?
Let me know where I can go to witness hysteria…

And when can I expect your bank transfer so I can pay for this air con?

It’s because repeated reminders of what to do in extreme heat saves lives. No everyone in the UK has been abroad and seen how things work in countries that are routinely very hot.

Dastardly2026

Put. In. Air. Conditioning. Speed. Up. Global. Warming.

Slow. Handclap.

Some people get very unwell. Some people die.

WTAF do you people think the NHS are giving out warnings about that?

And it's very easy to dehydrate quickly even if you think it's as simple as 'stay hydrated'. A commonality of people who need to be rescued while walking/hiking in extreme heat is that they have water with them.

Dr Michael Mosley, ya know a DOCTOR with substantial medical knowledge with his career focused on diet and exercise died of likely heatstroke on a Greek Island in 2024 in temps similar to predicted for some of the UK at the moment. After setting out for a walk as a fit older man, with1l water, a biscuit, loose light clothing, a hat, and a parasol.

I really feel sorry for those on crowded buses/trains/tube’s today along with where it will just be very difficult and there is no air conditioning

its very hot for the UK our buildings and infrastructure is not built for such heat and even now countries where is is designed for average hotter weather they are struggling, in Italy thay have have power shortages due to the use of people using air conditioning

this isn’t hysteria this is a very serious issues that we are now facing

It happens every single year. It’s this in the summer then cold and ice in the winter, excessive rain in autumn too actually. We all go to shit in any extreme.

This heat is fine and it’s lasting like 3 days. People need to get a grip.

There is a red alert. People need to take care. Esp young kids and the elderly. And those who can wfh should.

I do feel irritated by the hysteria though. People’s coping styles are quite different. I have to work in a hospital. My husband and son have left on the tube to central London for meetings in their respective offices. We have all dressed appropriately, taken water bottles and left early. We will try and be safe on the way home too. That’s all we can do. No fuss, no drama, no complaining about our employers on MN. We have to make the best of the situation.

The media and SM, including MN do ramp things up a lot and I wonder if it helps anyone.

Yes, people from other much hotter countries have always told me that they find the UK heat difficult. I think it is partly the humidity and partly the way buildings are designed to retain heat.

But I am constantly reading how all the elderly are going to get heatstroke and die on here! She was most likely sitting outside on her terrace, but believe it or not she did actually do things like shop, go to meetings etc. Not all the elderly sit at home all day every day.

Omg will someone tell the whole South Western Rail network to stop being hysterical?? Cancellations across the whole network - it's just a bit of heat.

Nobody said all the elderly are going to get heatstroke and die nor did anyone say all elderly people sit at home all day.

But there were around1500 heat-related deaths in the UK in 2025, mostly elderly people. I'd imagine there'll be more this year.

People die. It's not funny nor is it hysteria to be concerned about that.

Millions of people around the world endure hot temperatures and yes it's uncomfortable for these few days but the crap British weather will be back soon, fear not.

But OP, the increasing temperatures we're experiencing are unpleasant for some, including me - but that's as nothing compared to the predicament of say, people in India - especially farmers who will have to work in unprecedented temperatures. Yes, they might be used to heat, but if it increases beyond 40 degrees that's getting to the limits of what human beings can tolerate.

We're so lucky in the West - we have so much to make the heatwave bearable - even enjoyable - but people living in corrugated iron hovels or who have to work at exhausting physical jobs, it will be hellish.

Personally I can't function beyond 30 degrees so I'm incredibly grateful I don't have to commute into London any more. It's not 'moaning about a heatwave' - we can cope at the moment - but it's the scary prospect of things getting more and more extreme over the next few decades, with water supply being threatened in some parts of the world and the mass migrations etc which climate change will cause.

What country?

I know some see air con as the answer, but doesn't air con contribute to climate change - isn't it basically refrigeration? Happy to be corrected on this.

And OP - 'crap British weather' is vital. Without regular rainfall how are we going to grow crops?

I roll my eyes when, during a really baking summer with plants struggling, people moan when a bit of rain is forecast.

Are they so self-obsessed and stupid as to not realise how important summer rainfall is?

I hear people all around me panicking about the weather. Even when I go abroad in the summer I am told that it is going to be too hot, I'll hate it etc.

I think the truth is that Brits just have it in their genes, they are cold weather people.

I used to live in Singapore and HK. In the former, it regularly got up to 40/ 42 degrees with 90-95% humidity. It was literally like being in a sauna with someone chucking water on the coals. Yes, there was air con in buildings.

Mostly I'll be enjoying the sun, but this is what I will also be doing/ have done.

I just got up and closed all the blinds in any rooms the the sun is now shining through. I'll do that around the house as it moves. Keep the sun out of the room.

Any fans that I have, I've set them up and they are gently blowing away.

Make sure my dog has 2 bowls of topped up water and has a cool place to sit. I won't be taking him out.

Eat light. A salad. A glass of water on the go the whole time.

I'm going out later so hat, SPF and keep out of the sun. Wear something light coloured and cool. Linen or cotton.

Apart from that I will be enjoying the sun and I won't be getting hysterical about spontaneously combusting.

Hopefully I will still be alive later.