It’s time for Washington to save lives and act on extreme heat

Washington is facing a clear, growing, and silent public health threat. Extreme heat is already the leading cause of weather-related deaths in the United States. In Washington, the 2021 Heat Dome was the deadliest weather event in state history, resulting in an average of 18 heat-related deaths per day. Those deaths were not inevitable. They were the result of systems that failed to protect people inside their own homes.

This legislative session, lawmakers have an opportunity to respond.

As climate change drives more frequent and severe heat events, WPSR is working to help Washington’s legislature decide whether it will treat extreme heat as a predictable, preventable public health emergency or continue to accept avoidable illness, displacement, and death.

Heat Is a Climate and Health Emergency - and a Housing Problem

From a medical perspective, extreme heat is dangerous even over short periods. Heat exposure increases the risk of heart attacks, kidney failure, respiratory illness, and long-term neurological damage, and it worsens mental health stress and anxiety. These risks fall hardest on renters, low-income households, youth, outdoor workers, older adults, and people with chronic medical conditions.

Critically, most heat-related illness and death occurs indoors. During the 2021 Heat Dome, an overwhelming majority of people who died were inside their homes, often in buildings that trapped heat, with no safe way to cool down.

Yet many Washington renters are prohibited from installing cooling devices, even portable ones they already own. Others fear eviction or retaliation if they attempt to protect themselves. In practice, this means that during extreme heat, some people are left with a dangerous choice: break the rules of their lease — or risk their health.

That is not a personal failure. It is a policy failure.

As clinicians, these impacts are not abstract.

“During extreme heat events, I see patients come in with symptoms that are entirely preventable. Patients in the emergency room are treated in tubs full of ice.” More than once, I’ve had a patient tell me they didn’t use the air conditioner they had because they were afraid their landlord would penalize them. No one should have to make that choice.”

Dehydration can progress to kidney injury, heart conditions worsened by heat stress, and anxiety can spiraling because people can’t escape the heat in their own homes. Stories like this happen too often in Washington. They reflect a basic truth: cooling is not a luxury. It is a critical health protection, one that our housing and emergency response systems have failed to provide equitably.

What WPSR Is Working on This Legislative Session

Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility is advancing a coordinated, evidence-based policy approach to extreme heat — one that improves access to cooling, protects renters’ health, and strengthens statewide preparedness.

The Right to Install Cooling (SB 6200)

SB 6200 ensures that renters and mobile home residents can install portable cooling devices without unreasonable barriers. For many households, this is the difference between safety and serious risk.

Preventing someone from installing a basic cooling device during a heat wave does nothing to protect buildings, but it does put lives at risk.

Protecting Tenants from Extreme Heat (HB 2265)

HB 2265 recognizes extreme heat as the public health emergency it is. This legislation:

• Improves renter access to cooling

• Establishes protections from eviction during periods of extreme heat

• Moves Washington toward a future where homes are safer as temperatures rise

Simply put, no one should lose their housing, or their life, because their home becomes dangerously hot.

County-Level Heat Response Plans (HB 2183)

Extreme heat requires coordination. HB 2183 would require counties to develop and implement heat response plans, improving emergency preparedness, communication, and public health response before temperatures reach dangerous levels.

Planning saves lives and reduces strain on emergency departments, first responders, and local health systems.

Why This Matters Now

Extreme heat is becoming more common, more intense, and more dangerous. Relying on cooling centers alone is not enough, and assuming people can protect themselves without structural support ignores the realities of housing insecurity and health inequity.

Health professionals across Washington are calling for policies grounded in evidence and lived experience, that reflect what we see every summer: most heat-related illness and death is preventable.

This legislative session is a critical opportunity to act.

Climate Change is Making Us Sick in Washington

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 
Contact: Max Savishinsky, WPSR                                                
Phone: 206.547.2630
Email: Max@WPSR.org

Impacts and Solutions are Focus of WPSR's Climate/Health 2022 Report

Seattle, July 14, 2022 - Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility released its  2022 Climate and Health Report, detailing the harms of climate change to human health. The report enumerates the opportunities for improving the quality of life for millions of Washingtonians through climate action, including actionable steps that individuals, businesses, and policy-makers can take. 

Climate change and human health are inextricably linked, and the worsening effects of climate change are already having real, documented impacts on the health of Washington communities. The report finds that the 2020 wildfire smoke in Western Washington led to as many as 179 excess deaths from respiratory illnesses. From wildfire smoke to extreme weather events, Washington residents, especially low-income and BIPOC Washingtonians, are facing increasing rates of asthma, heat related illness, and threats from infectious diseases, among countless other health concerns.

“The longer we wait to act, the more the earth will warm, the more the climate will be disrupted, and the more dire and widespread the impacts and harms on people will become,” writes Ken Lans, a founding member of WPSR and a member of the Climate and Health Task Force.

This report serves as a guide for tackling climate-related health factors in our policies, in our healthcare providers’  offices, and in our homes. Download the 2022 Climate and Health Report.

Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility (WPSR) is a health professional-led advocacy organization working to create a healthy, just, peaceful and sustainable world. For over 40 years, WPSR has taken on the gravest threats to human health and survival, including advocating for nuclear abolition, economic equality, and climate justice.

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For more information, contact Max Savishinsky at Max@WPSR.org