Mexico has recorded 48 deaths due to a heat wave that has affected the country since March, the Government announced this Friday, while new temperature records are expected in the coming days.
A report from the Ministry of Health sent reports a total of “48 deaths nationwide in relation to the heat wave that began in mid-March” and another 956 people who have suffered various health disorders, according to data updated up to the 21st. of May. In 2023, a record 419 deaths were recorded due to an eight-month heat wave in Mexico, a country of 129 million people.
The current heat “is exceptional,” President Andrés Manuel López Obrador recently said.
“This is a very regrettable natural phenomenon, which of course is related to climate change,” he added, highlighting that high temperatures and lack of wind increase the pollution problem in the capital, Mexico City. With a population of about nine million inhabitants.
According to scientists at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), the heat could be even more intense during the next two weeks and break new records.
“In the next 10 to 15 days, Mexico will experience the highest temperatures ever recorded in its history, which could generate high levels of pollution due to ozone,” they wrote in X.
This week, several international media reported the death of several dozen howler monkeys in the state of Tabasco, in the south of the country, as a result of the intense heat wave, with record temperatures, that affects the entire country.
Under the effect of the heat wave, the primates found in the tall trees of the tropical forest faint and fall from about 20 meters high and end up dying from the impact or from dehydration due to the fractures received that prevent them from moving. explained Victor Morato, director of the veterinary hospital of the city of Comalcalco in a statement.