“To meet this challenge, we need bold systemic action. Governments at all levels must modernize laws and regulations to reflect the realities of a warming climate.”
“Extreme heat won’t wait for policy to catch up. And it won’t end when the summer does.”
This article is from the Canadian Environmental Law Association
Posted July 7th, 2025 on Niagara At Large
With each passing summer, the heat feels different, more relentless, more dangerous, and more difficult to ignore.
What was once seen as seasonal discomfort is now a growing public health emergency. Climate change (https://cela.ca/climate-change-impacts/) is intensifying the length, frequency, and severity of heat waves in Ontario and across Canada, pushing people and public systems to the brink.
Extreme heat isn’t just about rising temperatures; it’s about the growing risks to human health.
Prolonged exposure to high indoor or outdoor temperatures can cause heat-related illnesses like heat exhaustion or heat stroke, worsen chronic conditions such as asthma, cardiovascular disease and mental health challenges, and in many tragic cases, lead to death. In fact, the Government of Canada identifies extreme heat as the leading cause of weather-related fatalities in the country.
But not everyone is equally impacted. The impacts of extreme heat fall hardest on those already facing systemic barriers and marginalization. These include tenants in poorly maintained buildings, children in underfunded schools, people in institutional settings such as prisons, people experiencing homelessness and those without access to cooling.
Our laws, whether they govern housing, schools, workplaces or prisons, haven’t kept pace with the climate crisis. And in the absence of adequate policy, communities are left to try to cope alone.
Here are some of the groups most at risk:
- * Children in Schools/Child Care Facilities: Overheated classrooms and child care centres (https://cela.ca/blog-understanding-the-impact-of-extreme-heat-on-schools-and-child-care/) threaten children’s physical health and compromise their ability to learn. Many buildings lack ventilation or cooling, revealing gaps in education and public health policy.
- * Tenants: Renters, especially those in aging apartments, face dangerously high indoor heat. With no maximum indoor temperature standard (https://cela.ca/blog-too-hot-to-live-the-fight-for-cooling-rights-in-canadas-rental-housing/) in residential housing, many have inefficient cooling, have to pay out of pocket for cooling devices, or worse, go without.
- * Migrant Agricultural Workers: Often housed in temporary, substandard conditions, migrant agricultural workers (https://cela.ca/blog-ontarios-heat-stress-act-2025/) are frequently exposed to extreme heat in their housing and in their work, with little regulatory protection or ability to speak out.
- * Prisoners: People incarcerated in overcrowded, poorly ventilated facilities are often subjected to extreme indoor heat without relief. This is a matter of basic human rights and health equity.
- * Indigenous Schools and Communities: Many Indigenous communities face even greater impacts from heat due to being chronically underserved and underfunded for infrastructure and health services.
To meet this challenge, we need bold systemic action. Governments at all levels must modernize laws and regulations to reflect the realities of a warming climate. This includes setting maximum indoor temperatures in housing, schools and workplaces, providing cooling in institutional settings, ensuring heat protection plans for outdoor and precarious workers and investing in retrofits that improve safety without displacing tenants or raising rents.
This is not just a climate issue. It’s a health and justice issue. Awareness campaigns and individual action can help but the solutions must be structural, and rooted in law, equity and the right to safe living and working conditions.
Extreme heat won’t wait for policy to catch up. And it won’t end when the summer does.
The heat wave some of us experienced in Southern Ontario this week is a clear signal that climate change (https://cela.ca/climate-change-impacts/) is already here and without urgent action, those least protected will continue to bear the highest cost.
With each passing summer, the heat feels different, more relentless, more dangerous, and more difficult to ignore.
What was once seen as seasonal discomfort is now a growing public health emergency. Climate change (https://cela.ca/climate-change-impacts/) is intensifying the length, frequency, and severity of heat waves in Ontario and across Canada, pushing people and public systems to the brink.
About the Canadian Environmental Law Association (CELA) – The Canadian Environmental Law Association (CELA) is a legal aid clinic dedicated to environmental equity, justice, and health.
Founded in 1970, CELA is one of the oldest advocates for environmental protection in the country. With funding from Legal Aid Ontario (LAO), CELA provides free legal services relating to environmental justice in Ontario, including representing low-income and vulnerable or disadvantaged communities in litigation. CELA also works on environmental legal education and reform initiatives.
CELA exists to ensure that low-income and disadvantaged people have access to environmental justice through courts and tribunals. As long as communities face barriers accessing environmental justice, there will be a need for CELA’s work.
For more on CELA, visit its website at – https://cela.ca/
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