Yucatán has broken its record for deaths from heat stroke in 2023, with four deaths from this cause, in the midst of the deadliest heat season in the Yucatán Peninsula.
According to a report by the Federal Secretary of Health regarding the 2023 heat season, the current wave is the deadliest in seven years. Since 2017, Yucatán reported two deaths per year due to the heat, a toll that doubled in just three weeks, from June 21 to July 12.
The Peninsula sums eleven deaths from heat stroke so far in 2023, which is also a record number. Of these deaths, five are from Quintana Roo and two from Campeche. The previous maximum record for the Peninsula was nine deaths, in 2019.
Campeche also broke a record, since from 2017 to 2021, that state had zero annual deaths, with the exception of 2022, when it had one. Quintana Roo is about to match the 2019 record, when the state reported seven heat related deaths.
The Yucatan Ministry of Health reported the first deaths from heat stroke in 2023, the first occurring on June 20, when a woman died, and the next day a man died from the same cause. The other two deaths in the Yucatan were two men, one also on June 21 and the other on July 12. During that time, temperatures fluctuated between 39 and 41 degrees Celsius.
TYT Newsroom
