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Anorak News | Global Warming Gives You A Heart Attack Say Scientists

Global Warming Gives You A Heart Attack Say Scientists

by | 12th, August 2010

GLOBAL warming is the decade’s scare story. And news on the BBC is that thanks to global warming more of you are going to die of bad hearts. And you thought that Mediterranean lifestyle heading to the UK was good for you.

Michelle Roberts tells us:

Many more people will die of heart problems as global warming continues, experts are warning.

Experts in..?

Climate extremes of hot and cold will become more common and this will put strain on people’s hearts, doctors say.

Experts and now doctors? Or are the global warming experts also doctors and vicer versa

A study in the British Medical Journal found that each 1C temperature drop on a single day in the UK is linked to 200 extra heart attacks.

So, if you fly from a cold country to a hot one you will die? If you live in a north facing home and then sit in the back garden you will die? What about a 1C temperature rise on a single day?

No matter. Roberts has already moved on:

Over 11,000 people died in France’s heatwave in the first half of August of that year [2003] when temperatures rose to over 40C. Many of these were sudden cardiac deaths related to heart conditions other than heart attack.

So heat is bad for your heart. Or maybe the cold is bad for you? But how is global warming linked to it all?

That same summer, record-breaking temperatures led to 2,000 excess deaths in the UK. And experts predict that by the 2080s events similar to these will happen every year.

If they happen every year won’t we be better prepared to deal with them?

As for the science:

In the BMJ study, researchers from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine analysed data on over 84,000 patients admitted to hospital with a heart attack between 2003 and 2006 and compared this with daily temperatures in England and Wales.

They found that a 1C reduction in average daily temperature was linked with a cumulative 2% increase in risk of heart attack for 28 days, even in the summer.

Such are the facts:

Most of the casualties were people in their 70s and 80s, but people who had been taking aspirin long-term appeared to be less vulnerable for some reason.

Maybe it was global warming that saved the aspirin takers?



Posted: 12th, August 2010 | In: Reviews Comments (7) | TrackBack | Permalink