Extreme heat can take a major toll on mental health, according to Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health’s Amruta Nori-Sarma.
In a July 7 interview on PRX’s The World, Nori-Sarma, assistant professor of environmental health and population sciences, said that a growing body of literature over the past decade has shown a connection between extreme heat and mental health harms. Mood disorders, anxiety, stress, self-harm, substance use disorders, and schizophrenia tend to worsen during very hot weather, and mental health-related emergency room visits and hospitalizations tend to increase.
Nori-Sarma said there are a number of potential reasons why heat can harm mental well-being. One is loss of sleep. When it’s very hot it can be harder to sleep—and lack of sleep can exacerbate mental health conditions. Another is that extreme heat can change the effectiveness of certain medications.
She recommended checking in on family and friends with mental health conditions during heat waves. “It’s really important to make sure that people who are suffering from some sort of mental illness are not suffering alone, especially when it’s hot outside and we might expect that their symptoms might be exacerbated,” she said.
Nori-Sarma was also quoted about the impact of heat on mental health in a July 7 CBC article on summer seasonal affective disorder, a condition also known as “summer SAD” or “reverse SAD.”
