The British Government has declared a national state of emergency for the first time due to the record temperatures expected for Monday and Tuesday, especially in the center and east of the country.
The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) has raised the “heat and health advisory” alert to level 4, the highest possible, for the first two days of next week, when expect temperatures of 40º.
“At this level”, according to the statement collected by ‘The Guardian’, disease and death can occur among the healthy and fit, and “not only in high-risk groups”, especially in the areas of the A1 corridor north of London to Lincolnshire, in areas including Peterborough, Grantham, Sandy and Stevenage.
British Met Office spokesman Grahame Madge has described rising temperatures as a “potentially very serious situation”. “If we reach 40º we are going to exceed an iconic threshold, which shows that climate change is now among us,” he warned in statements collected by Sky News.
The organization’s chief executive, Penny Endersby, has described the extreme heat forecast as “absolutely unprecedented” and urged the public to take the warnings seriously. “Our lifestyles and our infrastructure,” she has warned, “are not prepared for what is coming our way.”