2.8 Billion People Could Suffer From Heatwaves in 2090: IOM

On Tuesday, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) warned that approximately 2.8 billion people, over a third of the current global population, could be exposed to heatwaves if the current global warming is not curbed and reaches an increase of 3 to 4 degrees by the end of the century.

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Around 1.3 billion people would be concentrated in the Indian subcontinent and other areas of South Asia, where nearly 60 million displacements have occurred in the past decade due to climate change, as reported by the IOM using data from the Global Data Institute and the Internal Displacement Monitoring Center.

These figures could be halved in a scenario where global warming could be kept below two degrees, according to a statement from the United Nations agency.

The Paris Agreement aims to prevent the average temperature rise from exceeding 1.5 degrees above the pre-industrial era (1850-1900). However, average increases of 1.4 degrees have already been recorded in the first 10 months of 2023.

In the past decade, over 200 million people were forced to leave their homes due to floods, storms, and fires, said Koko Warner, the director of the OIM's Global Data Institute.

Mathematical models developed with the information currently available show that global warming would expose up to 39 million people to river floods in 2090, with Sub-Saharan Africa being the most affected region.

"Climatic hazards are already a major driver of human mobility worldwide. Climate change is expected to increase their severity and frequency in many parts of the world. While there is an increasingly precise understanding of where and when climate hazards will occur and how many people will be exposed to them, there is still little knowledge of how human mobility will respond to these hazards," IOM said.