Sandra Chapman: Why we should worry about the effects of climate change

The cardigan came out again as the sun retreated yet this wasn’t the case in England where panic appeared to set in as the temperatures had the temerity to reach 39 to 40 degrees for days.

How hot is that? The English appeared to be in panic mode. And no, the one and only time I was in temperatures like that was when I visited South Africa back in the early 80s.

Was I too hot then, being advised to stay under the table where it was cooler? No, because we were advised to stay out of the midday sun and leave it to later in the afternoon which we did.

This was what the street traders did so we copied them. There wasn’t a hose pipe to be seen cooling down some idiot tourist who had realised that shopping was a no-no in the midday sun. Siesta time was for everyone.

Yet the English this week appeared to not cancel annual sporting events, shopping or sun bathing.

Here our beaches were crammed with people desperate to get that suntan as the midday sun blazed down. Press photographers filled the pages of newspapers like this one with photos from our favourite beaches of people who arrived by car because, even the vehicles were on the beaches. I presume they sweltered in those cars all the way back home not liking the prospect of a warm night ahead because their houses would have had to be locked up before they left it, sealing in all that heat. It’s easy to see how one can fall out of love with excessive heat even those who do their utmost to spend days in it half naked.

Our weather readings this week were a surprise to us but I’ve been reading up on world readings and wonder, for example, how the people of Cairo survived their 36 degrees on Wednesday or Bahrain its 40 degrees. Then there was Dubai at 40C, Marrakesh at 42C, Tunis 38C, the Bahamas (usually full of Brits at this time of year] at 31C dgs even Hong Kong at 33C. In fact I counted 50 countries where it was over 30C. Surely there are people in those countries who could make a fortune teaching us stupid Brits how to survive in the blistering midday sun?

Now Europe wasn’t so bad – I counted 16 cities – Paris was the worst at 40C – with temperatures in the middle and upper 30s this week, the sort of places frequented by the British in summer.

Many will come back and complain about the heat but go straight back again the following year.

Where will global warming take our blessed Norn Irn in the coming years/decades? Will we see places like Portrush, Portstewart, Bangor and Ballygally still crammed with dedicated sun worshippers, their skin aged beyond the years, so well accustomed with sun bathing they haven’t noticed the yearly rising temperatures? Will they become the generation who complain about the ways and means being used to slow down global warming because they still want a tan every summer to last them into autumn?

Will they care very much about the destruction wrought by climate change on farm land?

Will it worry them that animals used to the outdoors will have to be reared indoors in air conditioned conditions? What will that do to the cost of food? Is it fair to the animals? And what about our oceans, those creators of comfortable life for us? Our Earth has plenty of dead oceans from millennia back.

What happened then to aid their destruction? What do we really know about the first creatures on Earth which led to man? Everything then no doubt was the result of natural creation. That isn’t the case now. Experts say we are destroying that natural creation. But is the sunbather lying stretched out on any one of our beautiful beaches interested in earth’s future?

Maybe not. Yet climate change is not going to go away unless we start taking it seriously. The future matters.