First paragraph. This was reported by Qazaqyia.kz citing The Guardian.

Hosts' reactions to heat

As the first heatwave of the record-breaking summer arrived on 23 May, GB News host Cristo Foufas was not happy: "I am sick to death of the naysayers saying firstly that we're all going to die and that we have to put out heat alerts, because, you know, just drink some water and drink a bit less rosé in the sunshine."

"We used to call it Darwinism," replied co-host Renée Hoenderkamp, who is a medical doctor.

The arrival of the intense heatwave in late June – the most extreme recorded in Europe – didn't change the tone. "People die each year from vending machines falling on them, and coconuts hitting their heads. People die, unfortunately, that's a reality of life, and things get hot," said Will Kingston, a presenter and contributor on GB News. "It doesn't mean you have to go about changing your life in ways big and small to accommodate for it."

Over on TalkTV, there was also little empathy as the country sweltered in deadly heat. "I'm very sorry if someone dies because of the heat, but I don't think that's a reason for us never to be allowed to take a flight again, or stop being allowed to eat meat," said presenter Julia Hartley-Brewer on 24 June, citing policies no one is putting in place. Her guest, conservative commentator Benedict Spence, agreed: "One way or another, something's going to get you."

As that heatwave reached its peak, TalkTV host Kevin O'Sullivan was getting hot under the collar about the "asinine snowflakery" of climate concern: "Our hysterical hysteria over climate change because we've had a few nice days … It's a nice day. Now we call it … a death risk."

Death toll data

Then the numbers came in. The May and June heatwaves had killed about 2,700 people prematurely in England and Wales, according to an analysis based on the relationship established between heat and mortality in previous data, published on 13 July.

O'Sullivan dismissed the figures: "No such thing happened. They've sort of qualified it – and said 2,700 people might have died – and this has been apparently gamed by computer programmes and God knows what." He called the report "just disgraceful climate change scaremongering" and "absolute poppycock".

GB News presenter Kingston was also deeply unimpressed: "If there is one thing that Covid taught us, it is that modelling is effectively guesswork from clever-sounding people with an ideological agenda."

On 30 July, the UK Health Security Agency announced that 2,877 people had died because of the May and June heatwaves, using data on actual recorded deaths.

Hosts' opinions

Many hosts pointed to higher death rates from cold in winter. None were asked why any reduction in winter deaths due to global heating would mean the rising number of heat deaths in summer was acceptable. And it's not even true any more: the most recent figures from the Office of National Statistics show 2,805 heat-related deaths in England and Wales in 2025 compared with 2,244 cold-related deaths.

TalkTV presenter André Walker decided that one man in particular had blood on his hands: "I believe by the end of his career, Ed Miliband will have killed 100,000 people because of his crazy green energy policies that freeze people in the winter and cook them in the summer." He offered no evidence for this attack on the former energy secretary.

Climate change denial

You might think it would be hard to deny the basic reality of climate change as the temperatures soared outside. You'd be wrong.

There was straightforward denial on GB News with, for example, presenter Nana Akua calling the climate crisis a "scam"; Hoenderkamp blaming the sun; and fashion designer Jeff Banks saying, wrongly, that: "The facts are that carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has been declining for the last 150 million years." Over on TalkTV, Hartley-Brewer blithely told viewers in late June: "We've always had freak weather."

Fact check

The world's climate scientists, in reports signed off by 192 national governments, have been clear for more than a decade that 100% of global heating since 1950 has been caused by human emissions and activities. Every heatwave is being made more intense and more likely as a result of fossil fuel burning, and rising global heat kills one person a minute around the world, according to a major recent report in the Lancet.