With climate activists increasingly warning of killer heat waves every summer in Europe, the German government has drawn up a heat-wave protection plan that calls for more draconian guidelines and bans on sports events on hot days. [emphasis, links added]
Germany’s Federal Ministry of Health (BMG) is presenting three new heat-wave safety plans to better respond to the health effects of heat waves.
In doing so, the German authorities are expanding the “Health Heatwave Protection Plan” to include the areas of sport, pharmacies, and psychotherapeutic practices, according to the BMG press release here.
Adults still haven’t learned how to conduct themselves when it’s summertime, the authorities appear to believe.
The BMG says the heat-protection plans are intended to inform citizens about the health risks of heat and to protect people who are at an increased health risk.
In particular, this includes older people, the chronically ill, pregnant women, young children, and sports enthusiasts.
The heat protection plans are recommendations to protect and sensitize these groups against heat.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), sportspeople are among the risk groups particularly affected by climate-related health risks.
In cooperation with other organizations, the BMG has written a heat-wave protection plan for organized sports to better protect all target groups in popular sports from heat-related health risks.
This plan, the BMG reports, is intended to help clubs and associations protect athletes, full-time employees, and volunteers from heat-related health risks, e.g., coaches, referees, officials, and service staff, as well as spectators.
BMG federal health authorities propose recommendations for event organizers to heed, such as (from page 5):
- Ensuring heat- and acclimatization-friendly travel and event planning
- Determining whether and when competitions can be canceled or postponed in extreme heat
- Placing start and finish areas, as well as staging areas, in shaded areas.
- Avoiding open fires/barbecues.
The proposed guidelines get pretty extreme, and also include:
- Refrain from serving alcoholic, highly sugary, caffeinated, or taurine-containing drinks
- Offering mineral water, unsweetened tea, and thin juice spritzers
- Providing free drinking water dispensers
- Distribution points for free sunscreen, headgear, and loaner sunglasses.
Note that the German government here is presenting all this as recommendations that can be voluntarily followed. But we all know how such things develop later. We’ll have a heat czar before we know it.
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