A recent study from Rutgers University shows that Heat Stress may affect more than 1.2 billion people annually by 2100, assuming current greenhouse gas emissions.
Heat stress is caused by the body’s inability to cool down properly through sweating. Body temperature can rise rapidly, and high temperatures may damage the brain and other vital organs. Heat stroke is the most serious heat-related illness.
“When we look at the risks of a warmer planet, we need to pay particular attention to combined extremes of heat and humidity, which are especially dangerous to human health,” said senior author Robert E. Kopp, director of the Rutgers Institute of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences and a professor in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences in the School of Arts and Sciences at Rutgers University-New Brunswick.
The 1.2 billion predicted figure is four times the current number and 12 times the number who would have been affected without industrial era global warming.
You can read the full study here.