Monday, September 11, 2023
Heat-related deaths are up, and not just because it’s getting hotter Phillip Reese KFF Health News Heat-related illness and deaths in California and the U.S. are on the rise along with temperatures, and an increase in drug use and homelessness is a significant part of the problem, according to public health officials and data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Heat was the underlying or contributing cause of about 1,670 deaths nationwide in 2022, for a rate of about 5 deaths per million residents, according to provisional data from the CDC. That’s the highest heat-related death rate in at least two decades. Data from this year, which has been exceptionally hot in much of the country, is not yet available. The next-highest death rate was logged in 2021. Heat-related illness ranges from heat exhaustion, which causes heavy sweating and a rapid pulse, to heatstroke, which causes confusion, loss of consciousness, high fever, and in many
of the severest cases even death. Heatrelated illness can occur alongside and exacerbate other health conditions. The simplest explanation for the increase is that it is getting hotter. The last eight years were the hottest on record, according to NASA figures dating to the late 1800s. But factors other than climate change also play a role. Substance abuse, especially misuse of methamphetamines, has emerged as a major factor in heat-related illness. Methamphetamines can cause body temperature to increase to dangerous levels, and the combination of meth abuse, heat, and homelessness can be fatal. About 140 death certificates in California listed both heat-related illness and drug overdose as causes from 2018 through 2022, according to CDC data. That’s about 25% of all deaths in which heat-related illness was an underlying or contributing factor. Homelessness has risen in the past few years, including in several hot Western states like California, and
Brandon Bell Heat was the underlying or contributing cause of about 1,670 deaths nationwide in 2022.
unsheltered homeless people are particularly vulnerable during heat waves. Homeless people represented about 13% of California hospitalizations involving a primary diagnosis of heat-related ill-
ness from 2017 through 2021, state data shows. California’s 172,000 unhoused residents make up fewer than half a percent of the state’s population, federal data shows. See Deaths on 7
OSU’s Boynton shares Sept. 11 experience as a New York native Gabriel Trevino Staff Reporter
World Trade Center,” Boynton said. “Going through my mind at that moment was, ‘What kind of pilot was driving that plane? That’s a pretty big It already wasn’t a norbuilding.’ And it didn’t make mal Tuesday for a 19-year-old any sense... I get to Best Buy, Mike Boynton. buy the album, and I get back Jay-Z, fellow New Yorker to campus to a building where and a decorated rapper who it’s showing on TV. Boynton idolizes, was releas“And I see the second ing sixth studio album, “The plane fly into the other buildBlueprint.” Boynton left study ing. I was saying to myself, hall that morning to buy a copy ‘That’s not a coincidence. from Best Buy when he heard Something bad must be hapthe news over the radio. pening.” “An announcement came Boynton, now Oklahoma on saying a plane flew into the
State’s men’s basketball coach, wasn’t in his hometown of Brooklyn, New York, though. He was more than 700 miles away in Columbia, South Carolina, preparing for his sophomore season with the Gamecocks basketball team. Cellphones weren’t popular and it was difficult to check on his family. Boynton’s father worked at the New York Stock Exchange, and his grandmother worked at JPMorgan Chase Co. in the financial district of New York City: just blocks away from the destruction. See Boynton on 6
Ethan Scott Collin Oliver (left) had two tackles for loss and Lyrik Rawls (right) had an interception in the Cowboys’ win against Arizona State.
Gundy had ‘never been to war on the road’ with this OSU team, but defense battled in win against Arizona State Braden Bush Sports Editor
Chase Davis Coach Mike Boynton recalled exactly where he was when the 9/11 terrorist attacks happened.
Mike Gundy didn’t know what to expect out of his team Saturday night. Gundy coached his 93rd away game in 19 seasons as OSU’s head coach, but he knew less about this team and how it would react in a road environment heading into the Arizona State game than maybe any team he’s coached in the past. Not because of anything he’s seen or hasn’t seen at practice, but because of the number of new faces and new starters on the field. “You’re on the road, you’re playing a late, late, late game,” Gundy said on the Cowboy Radio Network
after the game. “We didn’t really know our team. I didn’t know our team, playing on the road… I haven’t really been to war on the road with these guys.” Things didn’t look great early. The OSU offense struggled to do anything – especially rushing the football – in the first half, and the defense gave up a pair of 70-plus-yard touchdown drives. But at halftime, the defense had a meeting and adjusted. It pitched a secondhalf shutout of the Sun Devils in OSU’s 27-15 win, and it put the offense in favorable positions to get things going. Now, Gundy has been to war with his team, and the defense showed it was ready to fight. See Defense on