‘Super’ El Nino to cause hundreds of heat deaths in Australia, 451,000 worldwide

The “super” El Nino is expected to cause hundreds of heat deaths in Australia over the coming months,a relatively small fraction of an astonishing number predicted worldwide.

Scientists from the Climate Impact Lab forecast there will be 260 extra heat-related deaths in Australia – almost half in NSW – from this month to February next year, as the record weather event pushes temperatures 1.2 degrees Celsius above normal.

In a report released on Tuesday, they warned the super El Niño would be a deadly glimpse at a climate-crisis-altered future.

“These anomalously warm conditions will resemble the higher temperatures that climate change is projected to deliver 20 years in the future and will lead to 44 per cent more extremely hot days than we would expect in a normal year.

“El Niño is effectively pushing us into the future – exposing us to temperatures that won’t be the norm for another two decades – before we have time to adapt and protect ourselves.”

Authors Michael Greenstone, Tamma Carleton, Genevieve Maricle and Emily Grover-Kopec predicted an extra 451,000 people will die worldwide in the first nine months of the event, from June this year until February next year.

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They pointed out the figure is about 65 times higher than the 6800 people believed to be dead or missing from the recent Nepal flash flood.

Wealthy nations make up a tiny fraction of the fatalities and Australia doesn’t even make it near the top 50 of affected countries.

“Our research has shown significant disparity in the relationship between mortality and temperature across income levels,” Grover-Kopec told nine.com.au.

“Regions with similar climate will often have quite different mortality outcomes due to their ability to adapt and mitigate heat-related deaths, such that poor regions tend to see higher numbers of heat-related mortality than their rich counterparts when experiencing similar temperatures.”

The worst of the tragedy is expected to hit the Sahel in Africa, where 31,400 people are expected to die in Nigeria alone from this month to February.

Similarly devastating figures are predicted for Indonesia (19,300), Sudan (17,500), India (15,800) and Brazil (13,300). That focus will shift further north as the northern hemisphere enters summer.

In Australia, NSW (120) is expected to be the worst affected state, followed by Western Australia (72), Queensland (61), Victoria (13) and South Australia (12).

“The anomalously warm temperatures that most of the globe will see during this El Niño event are a ‘postcard from the future’; while they feel anomalous now, they will become normal just a few decades into the future,” the authors wrote.

“Mortality projections for the near term provide a signal of where we are headed if new adaptation investments do not materialise.

“The difference with climate change is that there is more time to undertake adaptations to save lives.”

The report called for emergency support to be redirected to the worst affected areas and suggested heat warnings, health outreach to vulnerable populations, cooling centres and hydration stations as effective tools to reduce the number of deaths .

The worst affected nations were also urged to increase worker protections and health care system capacity.

The excess heat deaths come on top of deaths from natural disasters such as flood and fire and are calculated compared to the average for that month over the past 20 years.

"This report allows decision makers to see exactly where emergency actions can be taken now to ⁠save ​tens of thousands of lives in ​the coming months," said Greenstone, the lab co-founder and a University of Chicago economist.