Heat making you miserable? Global warming could lead to THOUSANDS more suicide deaths

Hotter temperatures and climate change could put thousands more Americans and Mexicans at risk of suicide, new research reveals. 

The series of heat waves sweeping the US and many countries worldwide may contribute to making life literally unbearable for some.   

Winter may bring seasonal affective disorder to some five percent of people around the world, but oppressive heat makes more people feel ‘trapped,’ ‘lonely,’ or ‘suicidal,’ Stanford University and University of California, Berkeley, scientists found. 

The estimated that if temperatures continue to climb as projected through 2050, the US and Mexico may be faced with an additional 21,000 suicide deaths.

Though climate is hardly the most substantial risk factor for suicide, the Berkeley and Stanford researchers caution that their findings demonstrate yet another tangible public health impact of global warming. 

For each one degree Celsius the temperature rises in US states and Mexican municipalities graph shows suicide rates may increase by one to seven percent in some places

By 2050, the average global temperature may creep up by as much as two degrees Celsius. 

If that does not sound like much of a surge, research broadly demonstrates that, in fact, it is. 

Not only will the temperature change undermine crop growth and depress sea levels, the heat can tamper with our brains and mess with our moods. 

And, according to the Stanford researchers, it isn’t something we simply get used to over time. 

The team examined both suicide rates and patterns of language and communication on social media platforms like Twitter. 

When they matched historical data on temperatures in each of the thousands of US counties and Mexican municipalities to records of suicides, the researchers found that the statistics rose parallel to one another.

What’s more, the hotter it was in their hometowns, the more people tweeted about feeling ‘lonely,’ ‘trapped’ or ‘suicidal.’ 

It didn’t matter if they were rich or poor, or lived in a place where the weather was often hot. The heat still seemed to get under everyone’s skin and destabilized their emotional states.  

Violent and aggressive behavior tends to ramp up with heat while empathy and kindness to others falls off, according to previous research. 

The study authors suggest heat also fuels suicide as a form of violence turned against oneself. 

Scientists at Lehigh University and Northwestern University demonstrated in their research last year that people trapped in hot, stuffy rooms were far more irritable and less willing to participate in so-called ‘prosocial’ activities. 

But the new study suggests that heat the heat can have much more meaningful and lasting effects than making us cranky for a day. 

‘We’ve been studying the effects of warming on conflict and violence for years, finding that people fight more when it’s hot,’ said Solomon Hsiang, study co-author and associate professor at the University of California, Berkeley.

As temperatures rise (bars at bottoms of graphs), the study suggests that suicide rates increase (multicolored lines) in US states (left) and Mexico (right)

As temperatures rise (bars at bottoms of graphs), the study suggests that suicide rates increase (multicolored lines) in US states (left) and Mexico (right)

As temperatures creep upward over time, the graphs show researchers' predicted increases in the possible number of excess suicides in the US (left) and Mexico (right)

As temperatures creep upward over time, the graphs show researchers’ predicted increases in the possible number of excess suicides in the US (left) and Mexico (right)

‘Now we see that in addition to hurting others, some individuals hurt themselves. It appears that heat profoundly affects the human mind and how we decide to inflict harm.’ 

They estimated that in the US, suicide rates stood to climb with temperatures by 1.4 percent by 2050. In Mexico, the 2.3 percent more people might take their own lives. 

Those increases are about equivalent to the impact of economic recessions on suicide rates, according to the study, published in Nature Climate Change. 

‘When talking about climate change, it’s often easy to think in abstractions,’ said co-author Dr Marshall Burke of Stanford.   

‘But the thousands of additional suicides that are likely to occur as a result of unmitigated climate change are not just a number, they represent tragic losses for families across the country,’ added Dr Burke, an assistant professor of Earth system science in the School of Earth, Energy & Environmental Sciences. 

The United Nations have made a goal of slowing down the world’s climbing temperatures. 

But even if we can limit the increasing heat, annual average temperatures will increase – and it has already begun. 

We may not be able to put a full stop to climate change, but, the study authors urge, we can can implement policies to otherwise counteract its potential affects on suicide rates.  

They note that gun restriction laws have been found to drive down suicide rates by roughly as much as they estimate global warming will drive up rates of these deaths.

‘Hotter temperatures are clearly not the only, nor the most important, risk factor for suicide,’ Dr Burke said. 

‘But our findings suggest that warming can have a surprisingly large impact on suicide risk, and this matters for both our understanding of mental health as well as for what we should expect as temperatures continue to warm.’  



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