Heat waves currently happening in North America, Europe 'virtually impossible' without climate change: Report

NEW YORK — The dangerous heat waves currently plaguing North America and Europe would be"virtually impossible" without anthropogenic, or human-caused, climate change, according to a new report.

Temperatures have skyrocketed to 45 degrees Celsius -- or 113 degrees Fahrenheit -- in some regions, prompting heat alerts, wildfires and heat-related hospital admissions and deaths, the researchers said. The study also found that climate change made the current heatwave in China at least 50 times more likely and that current temperatures in Europe and North America would not have been impossible without the effects of burning coal, oil and gas, deforestation and other human activities.

Because these heat events are expected to become more frequent, the need for humans to adapt and increase greenhouse gas mitigation efforts is vital, the researchers said. "In the past, these events would have been extremely rare," Friederike Otto, senior lecturer in climate science at the Grantham Institute for Climate Change and the Environment at Imperial College London, told reporters in a news conference on Monday."So it would have been basically impossible that they would happen at the same time."

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