With heat warnings popping up across the United States, rising temperatures are turning pavements and playgrounds into burn zones.

The burn center at Valleywise Health in Phoenix, Arizona, treated a record number of contact burn patients last year, including 15 deaths.

“It is definitely related to temperatures,” said Dr. Kevin Foster, the medical director of the burn center. “No question about that.”

When Foster and his team analyzed 16 years of data, they found a connection between rising summer temperatures, driven by climate change, and an increase in burns.

In 2008, when the average summer temperature in Arizona was close to 107 degrees, there were nine contact burn cases, according to Valleywise Health. By 2023, with the average temperature at 113 degrees, burn cases jumped to 120.

“Once it gets super-hot, then the number of burns goes up and the acuity, the seriousness of those burns, likewise goes up,” Foster said. 

Phoenix, a city grappling with the impact of heat on health, has applied a special asphalt coating on 140 miles of streets that reduces surface temperatures.

“The ground is a lot hotter than the air,” Robert Wooley, who had a burn contact injury, said. “That contact with the hot ground is potentially lethal. ”

Impact of contact burns

When Wooley, 76, lost his balance in his Phoenix backyard, it was a scorching day. He sustained contact burns on 20% of his body.

“I just couldn’t get back up and I looked at my hands in the skin that peeled off my hands, like the skin from an onion and looked like raw hamburger underneath,” he said.

The burns can be severe for children as well. A toddler suffered first-degree burns on his feet after running on hot pavement, but fully recovered after treatment.

“You really have to think about it ahead of time,” Foster said. “It happens so quickly and once it’s happened, you can’t go back. ”