By Jo Nova
We are killing people by making energy expensive
Researchers followed 80% of the US population for two decades, and found that cold temperatures contributed to a whopping 800,000 deaths while hot temperatures were linked to only 2,000 (per year).*
They were looking at monthly temperature data in 819 locations across the US. Then they checked the cardiovascular death rates and found the burden of excess deaths is “quite substantial”.
During cold periods our blood vessels contract to reduce heat loss, which is why our skin looks slightly bluer or whiter in colder weather. But even a small reduction in volume makes our blood pressure rise. So it is not surprising that colder months are linked to significantly higher death rates from heart attacks, strokes, and coronary artery disease compared to milder periods. As the population ages and kidney disease and diabetes get worse, the deaths will increase.
Nearly every dollar we pour into preventing heat deaths will end up killing more people than it saves. It’s time Climate Ministry’s put more accurate costings on any policy aiming to reduce global temperature. We want numbers, and during cold months the people need cheap oil or gas to keep them warmer.
Look at the shape of the curve. Wow!.
Cold deaths vastly outnumber the warm ones. (MMT = mean monthly temperaure)
The ideal temperature for homo sapiens, at least to avoid a cardiovascular death, is apparently 23°C (or 74°F) .
Cold weather linked to 40,000 extra heart deaths each year in the U.S.
ScienceDaily
The relationship followed a lopsided u-shaped curve: both extreme heat and extreme cold raised the risk of death, but the effect was much stronger on the cold side. Researchers estimate that cold temperatures contributed to about 40,000 additional cardiovascular deaths each year during the study period (about 6.3% of all cardiovascular deaths), totaling around 800,000 deaths over two decades. In comparison, hot temperatures were linked to roughly 2,000 extra deaths annually (about 0.33% of all cardiovascular deaths), or about 40,000 over the same time frame.
Planning for Climate and Public Health Risks
The findings suggest that communities should pay closer attention to the dangers of cold weather when preparing for climate-related health risks.
“We tend to focus on heat-related impacts of climate change, but climate change also includes extreme cold. We need to not only have heat-related mitigation measures, but also cold-related mitigation measures,” he said.
UPDATE: The study measures outdoor temperatures and not indoor ones and doesn’t account for any extremes, but other studies on indoor temperatures show a strong lopsided mortality curve too, so in a sense the outdoor temperature average is a proxy for a cooler indoor temperature — especially in poorer households.
One major confounder in this research is that Vitamin D3 levels and exposure to beneficial infrared from the Sun are also limited in winter. In some ways monthly temperature is a proxy for sun exposure and Vitamin D3 levels. Hence some of the cold associated deaths could be easily prevented by increasing D3 levels, though a substitute for the infrared is not so easily found unless people spend more time outdoors at midday in winter.
REFERENCE
Pedro Rafael Vieira de Oliveira Salerno et al (2026) Cardiovascular disease mortality attributable to monthly non-optimal temperature in the United States: a county-level analysis. American Journal of Preventive Cardiology, 2026; 101514 DOI: 10.1016/j.ajpc.2026.101514
*CORRECTIONS: The headline 40 to 1 ratio is actually 20:1. Corrected!. Apologies. Thanks to SH. And 2,000 deaths due to hot weather is per annum.
“Climate Change also includes extreme cold.”
Of course it does.
i’ve tried to concoct a one liner to make people snort coffee out of their nose this morning, but really one cannot do better than what these people do themselves. They don’t comprehend that they parody themselves.
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The aim is, after all, achieving
Carbon Zero©️
aka population reduction.
Thankfully here today, due to ex-TC Vaianu’s tropical influence, we’re achieving that nirvana-like perfect 23 C, despite Civil Defence & MetService warning of Code Red ‘life-threatening’ atmospheric conditions. Surf’s up!
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Carbon Zero©️
aka population reduction.
Funny thing though Greg, the quickest way to achieve “population reduction” is lift people out of poverty. Every developed nation on earth is in population decline, hence the need for mass immigration. Chinas’ population allegedly in rapid decline, Indias’ population is still increasing but it appears mainly among the poor and uneducated, the wealthy ones have fewer children. African, what to do once the sun goes down, lets watch telly, oh wait no electricity, slap and tickle then.?
It’s all “carbon”tm fault not even CO2 cause the plebs can’t tell the difference. ( yes we can)
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Interesting graph, never ask for whom the bell ends, it ends for thee.
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Speaking of bellends, we have a couple of them in charge of our energy systems.
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I couldn’t come up with a one liner, sipping my coffee l put it into four.
When global warming failed to live up to its promise
They decided to rebrand
From the pulpit, the false prophet hollers:
“It’s climate change wreaking havoc across the land!”
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Climate Ministry’s… this website is still having trouble with plurals, or should I say plural’s.
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Cold kills so expensive energy kills.
The parallels between Australia and the UK are amazing..
(Breitbart) “On resilience more broadly, the United Kingdom is very energy rich: the domestic production of coal ended before known reserves were exhausted, there are considerable reserves of oil and gas under the North Sea, and its potential for shale gas has never been touched. Yet the position of the government remains that generating traditional energy at home is a moral failing, and that oil and gas should be sourced abroad.
While fracking has allowed an energy revolution to cut prices in the United States, the British government was so certain domestic supply would not be beneficial to Britain it banned fracking at home and cemented the experimental exploratory wells. Meanwhile, even as an energy crisis rages, the final remaining coal-burning power plants — kept on standby for emergencies — were decommissioned and quickly demolished.
Even the most prudent backups like having a strategic reserve of natural gas is neglected, leaving the UK with one of the lowest stockpiles of any European country. An open goal like the former gas storage site — vast underground caverns where gas can be pumped in, holding 100 billion cubic feet — at Rough in the North Sea is ignored. Having extensive storage means a country can buy gas when markets are cheap and ride out spikes by using the banked supply, but Britain doesn’t do this because of government choices, leaving it at the mercy of markets.
The extremism of Sir Keir Starmer’s energy minister Ed Miliband keeps a lot of the answers to the energy crisis that Sir Keir decries and pins on Presidents Trump very much under lock and key, given they don’t fit with his green transition dogma. The official position of the government is that they are investing in resilience by subsidising energy bills to hide the true cost from consumers — and adding the difference onto the tax bill of future Britons — and by building renewables, all too often with Chinese-made solar.
Even Tony Blair is now calling on Miliband to reverse course and to sign off on new North Sea drilling to do anything, absolutely anything to keep the economy alive.”
Just substitute Albanese for Starmer and Bowen for Milliband, Rudd for Mandelson.
Such profound stupidity cannot cross half way around the world. It’s not viral or bacterial. You can only think they are taking their orders from China. Nothing else makes sense.
I suppose we will have to cede Christmas and Norfolk and Torres Strait Islands to China next.
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As the poorest and oldest are the most vulnerable, the true socialist solution is to make them the richest with subsidies. There is nothing the Government cannot do with subsidies. And when there is too little power in the system, you pay people to freeze and factories to close. Socialists believe government money solves every problem.
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Energy prices in the US are much cheaper than in Europe so presumably cold deaths would be higher in countries who can’t afford to keep themselves warm
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Their objective is Zero Population Growth for non-Elites.
Prophesied in the movie ZPG (1972) when this sort of nonsense started to become trendy.
Trailer: https://youtu.be/RLVrtfQ6Udk
The full movie is on YouTube. https://youtu.be/5w7Ahbd8QQU
(Sarc?)
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I was reading about the farce which is (“Climate Expert”) Ross Garnaut’s massive loss making windmill venture (Zen, $150Million in debt) as the subsidies could not cover the wind drought.
Famous economist and architect of Julia Gillards Carbon taxes (“not in a government I lead”) Ross was the Ambassador to China. It makes you wonder who is really driving this insanity.
In another article in the Australian I read that the $1Trillion (a million million) for transmission lines will cost the government nothing because they will be paid by the public in charges. How clever. You just push up the price of electricity to cover the costs of building anything. And of course that money goes to someone, like China. Like all these hidden Carbon taxes with either go to people like Garnaut or overseas to grow trees and so reduce CO2. Except that growing trees does not change CO2, but who in the world of big money cares?
I was amazed as a child to see automatic milking machines at a farm near Warragul in Gippsland, Victoria. Now Labor governments around the world have turned them on the taxpayers. And if they freeze to death, that is the price of equality.
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Born Lucky!
https://stopthesethings.com/2017/03/13/born-lucky-stars-align-perfectly-for-pms-son-with-mammoth-bet-on-wind-power-outfit-infigen/
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“As outfits like Infigen exist and only exist as a result of government mandates and subsidies, anyone backing them would need to be reading the political tea leaves with a particularly keen eye.”
I have written enough on the Turnbull fortunes. And the theft of $444million.
The old expression was Dracula in charge of the bloodbank.
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Looks like petty cash when compared to the missing VicGov public works projects $15 billion plus
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Have you seen the fully automatic milking rigs T deF? You’ll be even more amazed.
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No, I haven’t been young for a long time. I assume the new robotic milking machines chase the cows. And speak perfect cow.
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You mean like this? How can we block Dr Chalmers from this video?
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Has anybody got a link to the union milking machine?
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It’s called the Labor Party/Democrats. Socialism, Fascism and Communism all qualify. It’s why people will freeze to death, to save them from dying from a change in world average temperature of +2C in the peak of summer.
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This one has cows on a gigantic rotary!
Cows fighting to get on the rotary!
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The avoidance of more extreme cold deaths means we must have more available heating in our homes and that requires cheaper, reliable, electricity like BASEL-LOAD energy from COAL, GAS or NUCLEAR.
The last type of energy we need is expensive, toxic, unreliable rubbish like W & S.
The question is…. when will we wake up and vote these donkeys out ASAP?
That reliable base-load energy security also means we have more national security and prosperity.
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Americans are fleeing Communist run Northern States for the “Boom Belt” in Texas, Florida and the rest of The Southeast where everyone can open carry firearms and prosper, to say nothing of educational freedom and lower taxes.
Now you can also live longer it looks like because it is so much warmer.
Bye-bye New York City and your crooked Jihadist Communist Mayor.
It’s cold here in Montana, but it keeps the Californians away.
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I am always a bit peeved when I hear that no one could live in the South before air conditioning.
I was born (1950) and raised in The Lone Star State before A/C became wide spread and we did just fine,thx. My parents could only afford it after my brother and I joined the Navy in the late ’60s.
Anyways, to my point, I always
wondered how Northerners would fare without heaters.
BTW, here in Texas, my monthly winter heating bill is larger than my monthly summer cooling bill.
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Thirty years ago, when I purchased my first German car, on perusing the quite voluminous manual I came across a statement on heating the interior of the vehicle which basically said that constant empirical data pointed to the optimum internal temperature of the vehicle for human comfort as 22C.
Pretty close to 23C. At the time, I thought how very thorough of Germanic engineering in the attention to detail.
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Some time ago I visited Minneapolis USA and stayed with friends, one cold morning we were being driven in town and heard on the car radio routes that were open and closed to traffic and we had been discussing that the car had been plugged in to the house electricity earlier to maintain warmth in the cooling and lubrication systems to ensure that the engine would start after standing all night.
Then we were told that it was required by law to carry blankets and candles, if stuck and no heater operating in the car the candles with a window slightly open to allow air flow can maintain a liveable temperature inside the car.
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That was 30 years ago: today’s woke manual could possibly maybe might advise 0*C as the ideal interior temperature because, y’know, carbon zero™️
Car – Bon – Zero translated:
Vehicle Good Freezing 🥶
There’s a whole planet to save!
/s for schist.
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Lomborg’s team covered their BS and nonsense about heat and cold deaths in 2021 in the NY Post.
He found then that the slight global warming saved 166,000 lives from the existing COLD DEATH temperatures.
IOW heat deaths increased slightly but cold deaths decreased at a much faster rate.
https://lomborg.com/heresy-heat-and-cold-deaths
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Yes, but if Bjorn says that, it means he is a climate denier and must be cancelled. It’s the rule, you know. Everyone must listen to Al Gore, he’s the smart one.
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Linnea Luekin easily explains global heat and cold deaths globally.
It only takes 2 minutes and a transcript is available below the video and graphs and continents heat and cold deaths list are included as well.
https://climateataglance.com/climate-at-a-glance-temperature-related-deaths/
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Hopefully these results are broadcast widely in the US media. But, I wont hold my breath. However, it is slowly changing. Some commentators have noticed that NASA for example dont do climate alarmism any more. That with ARTEMIS that body now concentrates on space travel etc. Shocking that a fully funded government body with “space” in its name, now does space again. Thanks DJT. Also, well NASA sort of let the cat out of the bag a bit. A few years ago they presented results of satellite imagery indicating our blue planet had significantly greened over the last few decades. Remembering their Y11 biology again, apparently this was due to the CO2 fertilising effect and greater plant growth. Amazing, cold kills and extra CO2 helps the planet. Maybe white is white after all. Up is Up and a woman is an adult female human.
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3rd paragraph Jo, ends in “the,” as if something is missing?
[Ahem. Good point. Fixed. Thank you! – Jo]
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‘ … also cold-related mitigation measures …’
In a warming world that message might be hard to get across, BoM could warn that a cold air outbreak has the potential to kill you.
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Isn’t it funny that a species that evolved in nice warm regions of Africa tolerates heat much better than it tolerates cold.
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I think this is just as misleading a set of figures as is the Climatista’s 1 degree of warming will kill millions schtick.
The heat/cold mortality problem relates overwhelmingly to indoor temperatures (and outdoor temperature is a misleading proxy for that). For the “civilised” world we mostly heat our homes and business premises – so the primary problem is the poor and vulnerable’s ability to do that (economic inability to pay and/or poorly insulated and designed housing stock). For all practical purposes, in this respect, most of the world would be better off being warmer … but for most people, living wherever, it just doesn’t matter at all – we can afford to and are able to keep indoors “comfortable” 24/7/365 … and we could easily do so if the average temperature changed by 3 degrees either way.
That this argument is being pushed by the Cilmatista (or the anti-Climatista for that matter) is an abuse of rational science. This just isn’t a climate issue at all…
…it’s a purely sociological, welfare, economic one.
The solution (and the only solution) to temperature related mortality/morbidity is to invest in (i) plentiful, affordable energy for heating and cooling and (ii) improving the temperature-management functionality of the bottom level of housing stock (primarily insulation, airflow, shading)
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Angus, you are correct that the solution is cheap energy, but it is fair to assume that indoor temperatures in winter are cooler than summer indoor temperatures.
There is another big confounder I meant to mention in the post, which I’ve added to the post.
I’ve added an update to the post:
UPDATE: The study measures outdoor temperatures and not indoor ones and doesn’t account for any extremes, but other studies on indoor temperatures show a strong lopsided mortality curve too, so in a sense the outdoor temperature average is a proxy for a cooler indoor temperature — especially in poorer households.
One major confounder in this research is that Vitamin D3 levels and exposure to beneficial infrared from the Sun are also limited in winter. In some ways monthly temperature is a proxy for sun exposure and Vitamin D3 levels. Hence some of the cold associated deaths could be easily prevented by increasing D3 levels, though a substitute for the infrared is not so easily found unless people spend more time outdoors at midday in winter.
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Here’s a quick sun/D3 map for Aussies.
https://b2976109.smushcdn.com/2976109/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Screenshot-2024-03-28-at-1.57.38-pm-980×752.png
Of course Sardines are cheap, tasty and rich in D3 too…
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Pussies! Back in the day I used to bushwalk in shorts and t-shirt up a mountain covered in snow and ice at -19C for hours.
No adverse effects but I did shock carloads of tourists. 😆
It’s not just the temperature – movement keeps you warm and blood circulating better. Humidity, oft missed factor, is also a concern as it impacts temperature regulation via sweat evaporation.
As covered months ago, humans can adapt to different temperatures quite quickly, but the vulnerable exposed to a sudden event are most at risk.
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I read your comment for all the wrong reasons.
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https://i.pinimg.com/originals/94/30/b2/9430b21179ab1675b5ae17549e97c458.png
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I tried running in shorts in Colorado at -10C and recovered from near hyptothermia. -20C is dangerous with exposed skin. -40 is very dangerous and -50 is a court martial offence.
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Why is this graph truncated at the right hand end at ~27deg? What extra deaths do we get at say 37deg with a dew point of 25deg, a condition we often encounter here in Brisbane in summer?
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people who die of heart disease during the winter are killed by the climate
but people who die of heart disease during other parts of the year are killed by heart disease
that doesn’t make any sense
the 20 to 1 ratio is very deceptive
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Do you have any evidence the definition of heart disease is set differently according to the season?
Why is the ratio “deceptive”? The Gasparini study of 74 million people found a ratio of 17:1 using very different methods. These are big studies.
If you are going to make big claims, please link to evidence…
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