U.N. demands action on extreme heat as world registers warmest day

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is calling on countries to address the urgency of the extreme heat epidemic, fueled by climate change — days after the world registered its hottest day on record.

"Extreme heat is the new abnormal," Guterres said on Thursday. "The world must rise to the challenge of rising temperatures," he said.

Climate change is making heat waves more frequent, more intense and longer lasting across the world.

Already this year, scorching conditions have killed 1,300 Hajj pilgrims, closed schools for some 80 million children in Africa and Asia, and led to a spike in hospitalizations and deaths in the Sahel.

Every month since June 2023 has now ranked as the planet's warmest since records began in 1940, compared with the corresponding month in previous years, according the European Union's Copernicus Climate Change Service.