How heat makes health inequity worse, hitting people with risks like diabetes harder

EMTs help a patient in Austin, Texas, this week. The man had passed out near the state capitol and was dehydrated. Cities with few trees and areas of shade are hotter during heat waves. (Brandon Bell/Getty Images)

Within the past five years, Dr. Sameed Khatana says, many of his patients in Philadelphia have realized how climate change hurts them, as they fared poorly with each wave of record heat.

"Like most public health issues in the United States, extreme heat is also a health equity issue," says Khatana, who is a cardiologist at the University of Pennsylvania and the Veterans Affairs hospital in Philadelphia.