{
  "id": 13766566,
  "title": "THERMAL TRAP: How to protect yourself from El Niño’s extreme heat",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/10/11/thermal-trap-how-to-protect-yourself-from-el-ninos-extreme-heat",
  "topic": "health",
  "section": "Health & Medicine",
  "published": "2026-10-11T17:58:06.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Daily Maverick",
    "slug": "daily-maverick",
    "url": "https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2026-10-11-how-to-protect-yourself-from-el-ninos-extreme-heat/"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "Title: Thermal Trap: Protecting Yourself from El Niño's Extreme Heat\n\nEl Niño, a natural climate pattern, is causing extreme heat across South Africa. Professor Sibusiso Mkwananzi, a demographer at the Wits Reproductive Health and HIV Institute, emphasizes the severity of the situation. Extreme heat can lead to heat exhaustion, heat stroke, and other health complications. Vulnerable groups, such as children, pregnant women, the elderly, and those with chronic illnesses, are particularly at risk.\n\nIn informal settlements, temperatures can be up to five degrees Celsius higher indoors than outdoors due to corrugated iron housing. Immediate actions can help mitigate the impact, such as reflective roof coatings, community greenery, hydration depots, and passive cooling knowledge. These low-cost strategies can significantly reduce heat stress and improve public health during El Niño.",
  "summary": "As supercharged El Niño conditions bring dangerous temperatures across South Africa, mortality predictions, though jarring, only scratch the surface of the crisis.",
  "key_points": [
    "El Niño causing extreme heat in South Africa",
    "Vulnerable groups at highest risk for heat-related complications",
    "Low-cost strategies can reduce heat stress during El Niño"
  ],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}