Pakistan declares state of emergency as heat wave death toll rises to 800

Temperatures have been as high as 118 degrees in the southern Pakistani province of Sindh, where a heat wave has left nearly 800 dead. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has declared a state of emergency.

"The mortuary is overflowing, they are piling bodies one on top of the other," Dr Seemin Jamali, a senior official at Karachi's largest government hospital, told Al Jazeera. Since Saturday, her hospital has received over 5,000 patients with symptoms related to the heat.

Daily power outages have made the use of fans or indoor air-conditioning impossible, as well as limited the water supply in Pakistan's largest city. Wednesday has been declared a government holiday as a measure to prevent more deaths, although many private offices remain open. Protestors have taken to the streets to express their anger over governmental mismanagement during the crisis.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Many Pakistanis are fasting from dawn to dusk due to Ramadan, exacerbating the situation. In late May, unusually high temperatures killed more than 2,000 people in India.