UN agencies have urged employers, trade unions, local authorities and health experts to team up on creating tailored plans to protect workers from heat stress, as a warming world exposes them to more extreme temperatures, risking death and chronic health impacts. 

In a report released on Friday, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said climate change is increasing the temperature of workplaces – especially outdoors – and creating conditions that threaten workers’ health and national economies.

Extreme heat is causing a rise in heat stroke, dehydration and long-term kidney and cardiovascular damage – especially for manual labourers in physically demanding sectors like agriculture, construction and fisheries, the report found.

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“The workers keeping our societies running are paying the highest price,” said Rüdiger Krech, director of climate change and environment at the WHO.

For every degree above 20C, workers’ productivity is lowered by 2-3%, which can negatively affect individual incomes and national economies, the report said. 

According to the International Labour Organization, more than 2.4 billion workers are exposed to excessive heat globally, resulting in more than 22.85 million occupational injuries each year.

“Protection of workers from extreme heat is not just a health imperative but an economic necessity,” WMO’s Deputy Secretary-General Ko Barrett said in a statement.

“Occupational heat stress has become a global societal challenge, which is no longer confined to countries located close to equator – as highlighted by the recent heatwave in Europe,” he added.

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In mid-July, Spain’s environment ministry said high temperatures in the previous two months caused 1,180 deaths in the country, a sharp jump from the same period last year. Among them was a 51-year-old female street cleaner in Barcelona who died after working a Saturday shift in the middle of a heatwave.

Her death caused the Mediterranean city to tighten its heat protection protocols for cleaning contractors, which will now kick in at a lower temperature threshold of 34C instead of 37C. The measures include hourly water breaks and routes planned to keep workers in the shade as much as possible when the sun is high. At 40C, employees will only work using vehicles during the hottest hours, news agencies reported.

Tools on hand to stop ‘silent killer’

The WHO’s Krech told journalists that the UN agencies want the private and public sectors “to co-create tailored plans in your community, enterprise, environment, in your city, in your hospitals, that are practical, affordable, environmentally sustainable – and of course, effective, and that can be implemented at scale”.

The WMO’s senior director of services, Johan Stander, referred to earlier reports that the past decade was the hottest on record, adding that weather and climate science is available to help businesses and governments improve workplace safety.

The new report recommends actions and practices that he said should be implemented for everybody.

They include ensuring workers drink enough liquids and have access to toil