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Heat wave kills more than 1,100 in India

http://edition.cnn.com/2015/05/25/asia/india-heatwave-deaths/

Stifling heat has killed more than 1,100 people in India in less than one week.

The worst-hit area is the southeastern state of Andhra Pradesh, where authorities say 852 people have died in the heat wave. Another 266 have died in the neighboring state of Telangana.

India recorded its highest maximum temperature of 47 degrees Celsius -- 117 degrees Fahrenheit -- at Angul in the state of Odisha on Monday, according to B.P. Yadav, director of the India Meteorological Department.


Somehow, this has not attracted too much attention.
If this was a cold wave, it would have made the headlines much earlier

If it was a heat wave that killed some 10's of people in USA or in Europe it would have made the headlines much earlier.

Who cares about the Indians, there are 1B+ of them anyway

That is the problem. When the population explodes without any limit, the standard of living proportionaly declines. At the time of independence (1947), the Indian population was just 265 million. It has increased by 500% ever since. Right now, there is not enough land for everyone, and hundreds of millions are homeless. Most of the fatalities in this catastrophe came from the homeless community.

This piece of news will soon be on the front page of Reddit. Maybe not.. Maybe.. Top 10 pages. Anyway, I have some online friends that come from India. I hope that they will not be affected by this heatwave.

Heat waves disproportionately impact people who are poor, elderly, children, or have asthma or heart disease.
This is warning for us, we must more concern about " Global Warming ".
Global warming is one of the gravest health emergencies facing humanity, it's life threatening and it's affecting us now.

I've always been very curious about heat and cold related deaths.

How do people know they are the direct result of this?

They say 70,000 people died because of the European heat wave of 2003. What chain of events would kill that many people unless they were all vegetables living alone?

I was stuck in Italy for a summer in a place with no air con when it was 30-35c at night and regularly topped 45c for several days. It was disgusting but any semi alert human knows how to mitigate it.  

I didn't know that about the population growth, it's a very interesting statistic.

I guess what it really shows is that the government can't offer enough services to it's population, otherwise there would be enough water and medical help to stop so many dying from the heat.

That said, whenever there is a big heatwave in Europe there ae also lots of deaths.  I think the elderly who may well have been on their way out anyway are very prone to the heat, especially when it hits 40degrees or more.

The difference between the European heat-wave and the Indian heat wave is that, during the former, most of the victims were aged 80 years or older. Most of them were suffering from various illnesses, well before the heat wave. However, in India, the majority of the dead consists of working-age people and children, with no prior health issues. 

Just like the cod fishing industrys in the 80s no one will listen ot the experts.. no one.  No one wants to hear they can't drive massive cars, have to pay more for power etc.

It takes a minimum IQ to understand you can't just stick your head in the sand and it will be ok.  Alas that IQ level is probably the top 70 percentile.  Look at the shit people believe.. the insane religions out there only a full blown moron would believe yet millions follow them..

I would gander there is a VERY good reason people have taken up a claim of antiartica... Most of the time that earth has been around that has been the best spot to live...

Report at Channel NewsAsia 30 minutes ago said there is now 1800 people death from the heatwave. While on the other side of the planet, USA, Texas, they are having one of the biggest flood in their known history.

And 90% to 95% of the deaths have occurred in a single state (Andhra - Telengana). There is something wrong with that region, as the other states are also seeing similar temperatures and far fewer deaths. The heat wave will continue for many more weeks, and I fear that the death toll may surpass the 5,000 mark.

The standard of living in India actually increases. You can look at the statistics. Their economy is growing fast. Also rate of berth per women decreases. It will be less than 2 berths per women in a 20-30 years. Demographics becoming problem everywhere actually. 50-60 years and world population will start to decline.

May be. But at an extremely slow pace.


No. During the 2008-2014 period, the economic growth was pathetic.


Right now, the fertility rate is like 2.6 children per women. It will take many decades to lower it to 2.1. Also, even after reaching the TFR of 2.1, the population will continue to grow, due to the young population. May be by AD 2070, the Indian population will start declining. But by that time they will be having a total population of 2 billion.

It is a man made disaster and we all are to be blamed as we have cut jungles indiscriminately and replaced them with concrete jungles.
Plant more trees for your future.

Yes, thats what I talking about. 50 years to start declining. And Indian economy is growing way faster than american or russian for example =)
And yes, by that time Indian population will be like 20% of the world population. It should peak at about 10 billions in a 50-60 years. =)

Are you saying that it was all body heat that did it?    :D

While I don't believe that man has more that scratched the climate, and that the climate would have basically acted this way without man, plant more trees anyway.

:)

Why slow the population down. As it is, there is plenty of room. We just aren't using it properly. Besides, Neal Adams has shown us that the earth is expanding. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJfBSc6e7QQ&list=PL5A1097F4E958728D

:)

That's all because people are very competitive creatures. They just love fighting and killing each other, just so they can say, "I did it." Then, in the last few seconds of life, they realize, finally, just how precious life was.

:)

India is a very small country, with only around 150 million hectares of land available for agriculture. If the population climbs to 2,000 million, then India will have to import most of its food from outside. That will slow down the economy even further. And when you compare the economic growth of India, you should do that against countries such as Sri Lanka and Pakistan, which are having similar economic conditions. You can't compare the economy of India against that of developed countries such as the US and Russia.