70% women in extremely hot districts experience amplified health risks: Study

EXTREME heat is emerging as a grave public-health threat for women across India's most heat-vulnerable states, according to a new study by the MS Swaminathan Research Foundation (MSSRF) in Chennai.

- BINITA JAISWAL @Chennai

The research, conducted in Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, and Uttar Pradesh, reveals that heat is no longer just an environmental concern but a crisis affecting women physically and mentally with rural and informal workers facing the harshest impacts. Across high Heat Vulnerability Index (HVI) districts, 70% of women surveyed reported severe physical symptoms during peak heat months, including fatigue, dizziness, dehydration and gastrointestinal discomfort. The study found the effects to be sharply gendered, with women from poorer households, lower castes, rural backgrounds and informal livelihoods reporting significantly higher rates of reproductivehealth issues, menstrual irregularities, urinary infections, mental distress, workplace harassmen