Question about hot weather and climate change

[garlictwist]

This is a genuine musing, so please don't leap on me.

We had two days of incredibly hot weather. Everyone says this is due to climate change. But all the days surrounding those two days were normal, disappointing UK summer weather (17/18 degrees) and, looking at the forecast, going to stay that way for the forseeable.

If the high temps were due to climate change rather than an anomaly, wouldn't we see them take place throughout the whole summer? And wouldn't the other days be warmer than normal too?

I guess I'm just trying to understand how we know what is climate change and what is general fluctuation.

Well there’s weather and there’s climate. Climate change means that we’ll have more of these very hot days, not that every day will be hot.

I understand it that there are natural fluctuations in weather, but that global warming has caused the really hot days to be even hotter.

So there have always been the odd very hot days, but now the record has been broken for how hot those anomaly days are.

I understand it too that they are just a symptom of a much bigger problem and that huge environmental changes are happening.

It could well be a disaster, and for many that is sadly a foregone conclusion. But it is very much something we can limit, and the steps will improve our quality of life at the same time.

hmm

Reopening a zombie thread just to say hmm?

What are some of the potential health risks associated with prolonged exposure to hot weather conditions, and how might these risks change in a warming world?

You'll change disease patterns, especially for those carried by insect vectors. It's likely the malaria zone will spread

But as climate change doesn't simply mean hotter weather - the warmer oceans for example drive more powerful storms, with higher rainfall - you are also looking at destroyed homes, businesses and farmland. Plus contamination to the water supply. That might not be an immediate cause of disease in developed countries, unless you are cut off and they can't get bottled to you for a while, but diseases from filthy water kill thousands every year anyhow (which I think is one of the biggest scandals on this planet, some countries are so rich but other places don't even have clean water and basic sanitation) and kill more after floods take out what infrastructure there is