Greta Thunberg has warned that 40C heatwaves in the UK are “only the beginning” and says Britain’s leaders have “their heads completely buried in the sand” regarding climate change.

Greta Thunberg has warned that 40C heatwaves in the UK are “only the beginning” and says Britain’s leaders have “their heads completely buried in the sand” regarding climate change.

Her comments follow revelations that Labour ministers met fossil fuel industry lobbyists more than 500 times during the party’s first year in power, while Labour MPs took tens of thousands of pounds in donations from oil and gas lobbyists.

The activist, 23, was speaking as the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) issued a rare red heat-health alert for the first time since 2022, with temperatures forecast to reach as high as 40C later this week.

“This is what experts have been warning about for decades,” Thunberg told Metro. “This is unfortunately only the beginning.”

She added: “We know that the climate crisis is here and now, and not a faraway threat in the future, and those suffering the most are the ones who have contributed the least to cause it.”

The red alert – which indicates heat that is life-threatening for even the healthy population – covers the East and West Midlands, London, and southern and east England from 1am on Wednesday until 11pm on Thursday.

The heatwave could also disrupt transport infrastructure, food and water access, energy supplies and force businesses to close, UKHSA warned.

Thunberg said: “What is most concerning about this is not only that we continuously shatter heat records and destabilise the entire biosphere way faster than models have been predicting, but that it is not treated as the existential crisis it is in media and politics.

“The UK’s responsibility for the climate crisis cannot be overstated, still its leaders continue acting as if there was no tomorrow.”

Research by UKHSA published last year found that as well as the elderly, the very young and people with pre-existing medical conditions, people experiencing poverty, overcrowded housing or difficult economic circumstances are also at far greater risk in the heat.

Thunberg’s comments were echoed by climate scientists, including professor Friederike Otto of Imperial College London, who said politicians had failed to respond to the first red heat-health alert in 2022.

“Our first 40C day was supposed to be a wake-up call, but clearly someone hit snooze,” she said.

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