The last fall down stairs because of the heat resulted in multiple broken ribs, a wrist and her lower leg. It’s a good thing, most of the time, to be taking them. We’re seeing lots of people who feel very dizzy, some of whom have fallen over and hurt themselves as a consequence.
A wrist fracture can take a couple of months and a broken hip or lower leg more than six months.” Boyle, who was president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine from 2022 to 2025, is reflecting on the growing impact of unusually high temperatures on the health of the population and on the NHS, which treats the illness and injuries that extreme heat causes. He is talking on Thursday as the UK records the hottest day – 38.1C (100.6F) – of a year in which the first two heatwaves alone, in May and June, together caused 2,877 deaths, according to UK Health Security Agency estimates – almost double the 1,504 heat-related deaths it recorded during the whole of 2025. Figures published by NHS England on Thursday pinpointed July’s two heatwaves as a key reason why a record 2.5 million people attended A&E that month.
They included people whose breathing problems and other underlying health conditions were exacerbated by the heat, it said. Also, the heat pushes some young people to go swimming in unsuitable and unsupervised rivers where they drown. Heatstroke is very dangerous.
There is minimal air conditioning in many of our hospital rooms, so ill people are being made hot and this just can’t be good for them. A doctor going in to visit a patient with an infectious disease has to wear full personal protective equipment, like they did during the Covid-19 pandemic. We have to then put on a tight-fitting mask and a full gown until you know whether it is or isn’t.
You’re in your own clothes, already sweating, and then on top of that you have to essentially put on full PPE,” she says. The risk of infections also helps explain why so few hospitals have proper ventilation, air conditioning or fans, Sawicka explains – in case they unwittingly spread bugs. Jean (not her real name), a nurse at a London hospital, reports: “We have some fans, but not enough for all the patients.
So there have been problems and patients fighting over them. It’s high time that we got some AC for everyone so that patients aren’t fighting each other.” Their uniforms can also make already sweaty nurses feel even hotter, Jean adds. We’ve been asking management for a long time for lighter uniforms for us, but they’ve not done that.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
