Guardian: Extreme Heat Poses Threat to Spanish Beach Tourism
10 hours ago Eric Worrall 18 Comments
Essay by Eric Worrall
So go swimming a few weeks earlier in the season?
Extreme heat poses ‘real risk’ to Spain’s mass tourism industry
Public health adviser says higher temperatures caused by climate crisis pose danger for visitors not used to them
Sam Jones in Madrid
Sat 27 Jul 2024 14.00 AEST
The climate emergency poses a “real risk” to Spain’s traditional mass tourist model as rising temperatures and more frequent heatwaves hit the country’s most popular coastal destinations, a senior public health adviser has warned.
Héctor Tejero, the head of health and climate change at Spain’s health ministry, said the increasingly apparent physical impacts of the climate emergency had already led the ministry to begin talks with the British embassy on how best to educate “vulnerable” tourists about coping with the heat.
Asked whether the climate emergency could lead to tourism disappearing from parts of Spain in the future, Tejero said: “It’s a real risk because the big Spanish sol y playa tourist areas – the areas that are most dependent on tourism – are places where the impact of climate change is going to be greatest in Spain; places such as the south and the east of the peninsula – basically the Mediterranean coast. There’s a definite risk that the zones where there’s most tourism will become less habitable because of more heatwaves and much hotter nights.”
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2024/07/27/guardian-extreme-heat-poses-threat-to-spanish-beach-tourism/
