“It’s tough”: Europeans faced insomnia and dizziness due to record heat

The British edition of The Guardian cites several stories from residents of European countries complaining about unprecedentedly hot weather.

With sea temperatures reaching 20 degrees, Spaniard Grabiela Rojas, an open-water swimmer, says it’s not safe to train in the ocean near Valencia this summer.

According to The Guardian, Rojas, 35, instead trains by swimming laps in an indoor pool rather than long distances in the ocean. “It’s too hot in the water,” she says of Spain’s coastal waters, which have broken new records for this time of year. There is a moment when you can’t calm down. It’s tin.”

Rojas tried to train at sea a couple of times about three weeks ago, but says it was dangerous. The water didn’t help the heat. “It’s so humid in here, and then you step into the water and it’s like dipping into soup. Five minutes later, I was out of breath, dizzy, panicked a little, and walked out. I’ve decided I’m not going back until September or when it gets colder.”

The woman says that this year she installed solar panels at home, which allowed her and her husband to keep the room reasonably cool. “We turn on the air conditioner non-stop because it’s free. Last year we were much more conscientious because we didn’t want to pay the 500 euro electricity bill.”

However, the bedroom appliance broke last week and the wait for repairs was excruciating. “I won’t be able to function if I can’t sleep comfortably. The fan doesn’t help. My husband and I sleep in separate rooms because one more source of heat is too much, says the Spaniard. “I just try not to go outside. Last year I would go out at night for a walk – now I just don’t want to do it. Going outside feels like a punishment.”

A fourth heat wave is forecast for southern Europe next week, leaving the region’s residents with little chance of recovering from the previous one, with temperatures hitting 47 degrees Celsius in parts of Sicily, The Guardian notes.

Trying to escape the heat, Rosalind Smith, a sales representative living near the northern Italian city of Pavia, climbed up to her cabin in the Varzi Hills. But even at high altitude, conditions prove difficult for the 67-year-old woman who has lived in Italy for 35 years. “I climbed to a great height, but this was followed by heat and mosquitoes, which is so unusual. I was terribly bitten. Last year there were several of them, but five years ago there were none at this height.”

She says being indoors due to prolonged extreme temperatures is reminiscent of the early days of a pandemic. “It’s like being in quarantine again. This brings back the old feeling that you need to be on the street as little as possible. The heat makes it hard for you to think straight. I have sleepless nights – I turn my pillow over all the time.”

Smith says summer has changed since she moved to Italy more than three decades ago: “It’s a completely different thing. Extreme heat starts earlier and lasts longer. In Italy it is called la bella stagione – a wonderful time of the year. This is no more. I can’t wait for summer to end.”

And Noelia Rubio, 43, a store owner in Madrid, struggles with fatigue as the Spanish summer drags on. During the summer months, she sleeps in a room in her basement because it’s cooler: “But it’s still hard to fall asleep because it gets hot the moment you lie down… and when you fall asleep, you sweat all night. We are all sleep deprived; you get up in the morning already tired. This goes on for two to three months every year, and the season is getting longer. We used to joke that we had about a week of spring and a week of autumn weather. This is no longer the case: summer now starts in May and ends in October.” Whereas previously she slept in the basement from the end of June to the end of August, last year she did not return to her bedroom until the end of October.

“You can get used to the heat, but it’s still easy to get dehydrated and get headaches even if you’re indoors,” Rubio says. “I think it affects the health of every person. The heat is not a problem when you are on vacation, but in everyday life when you are working… it is really frustrating.”

Others say heat stress is causing them to lose their jobs. CB, a bicycle food delivery courier in Budapest, canceled his shift earlier this week due to health concerns. “Finally, I will be burned next month when I get paid, but I feel like it was worth it because I don’t want to get heatstroke.” According to The Guardian, this 32-year-old man recently moved from the US to Hungary to be closer to his father.

The courier believes he developed symptoms of heat stroke during an earlier heatwave in the city. “I had chest pains and was delirious on my bike. Even at night I couldn’t cool down properly – I don’t have air conditioning; here in Hungary it is not in fashion. One of my colleagues is also experiencing difficulties. We talk when we are waiting for orders. I have noticed that there are fewer couriers on the roads,” he says, although he is not sure if this is due to the heat.

Francesco, a paramedic from Milan, also experiences the physical and psychological effects of the heat. “Usually I don’t suffer from the climate – I’m quite adapted. This is the first time in my life that the heat has become a problem. Towards the end of the shift, I feel the psychological effect of the intense heat – my brain was not working properly. I always feel tired and become more irritable.”

“The air in the city is so hot that even when I start my shift at 6 am, I come to work sweaty and have to take a shower before starting work,” says Francesco. “As soon as I start working, my uniform becomes a suffocating moisture trap and soon I’m drenched in sweat again. Many times I have to call other ambulances for support because I don’t have the strength to lift and move patients.”

Temperatures in the city have become noticeably more extreme in recent years, Francesco said. “I can feel the difference in temperature at a central point in the city and outside. In the very center of the city, it’s like being in a furnace.”

Extreme heat can affect older people more than others, and while visiting her mother-in-law in the Athens metropolitan area this week, Jen Rose, 38, was worried about the 73-year-old woman’s well-being. “I am very worried about the impact of this heat on my mother-in-law’s health, especially due to the increased risk of forest fires. The last time there was a fire near Athens, the air quality in her apartment was appalling,” says Rose, a Hastings-based copywriter.

Like Smith in Italy, Rose also notes the climate-related mosquito problem. She says she was bitten for the first time in Athens by a tiger mosquito, an invasive mosquito species increasingly found in European countries.

In addition to worrying about her mother-in-law, Rose says she is concerned about the impact heat stress has had on her eight-year-old daughter during her stay in Greece. “On the first day, our daughter got dizzy and we had to retreat to an air-conditioned pharmacy to sit down,” she says. “It’s just crazy with these temperatures, and we haven’t even got August yet.”

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