The wretchedness of the city’s millions is perhaps encapsulated in the pictures below taken over the course of the heatwave.
The death toll of over a thousand dead so far and over 40,000 treated for heatstroke is grim indeed. Experts have already said the heatwave has been caused by climate change and that it may yet repeat itself in the coming years.
To that end, even private citizens have tried to take the initiative to help out and assist hospitals in coping with the flood of heatstroke victims.
A father waits for medical assistance for his dehydrated child at a Karachi government hospital.
Volunteers at a Karachi hospital throw cold water on a heatwave victim.
An Edhi rescue worker tries to supply aid to a heatstroke patient in Karachi
A man pours water on his head to cool off from the heat in Karachi, Pakistan, June 25, 2015A boy stands while looking outside a window of a building in Karachi — over 1,050 residents of Pakistan’s largest city have lost their lives in the past week because of deadly heatwave.
Even Karachi’s bird life has been affected by the oppressive weather.
A man carries the body of his three year old son at a Karachi morgue. He died because of the heatwave
A man tries to cool himself
A man cools off from a public tap after filling bottles during intense hot weather in Karachi
A woman affected by the heat brought to a government hospital in Karachi by her family.
A man rushes a child suffering from heatstroke at Karachi’s Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre.
A man uses a handheld fan to cool down his son, while waiting outside Karachi’s Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre
A woman sprinkles water on her feet to cool off in the heat
A woman uses a piece of cardboard to fan her son, while waiting to be seen at the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre
A volunteer puts an identification tag onto a body of heatwave victim as other bodies are seen in the the cold storage of the morgue in Karachi
A Karachi resident affected by the heat tries to sleep at a city mosque
Mourners sit beside the body of a relative who died in the intense heat wave in Karachi
A sign posted outside the morgue of Karachi’s Edhi Foundation — says in Urdu “No space left in the cold storage for any more bodies”.
Two women who lost their loved one during the heatwave grieve.
Relatives sit beside bodies of relatives wrapped in shrouds.
Relatives shift the body of a heatwave victim into an ambulance at the Edhi morgue in Karachi
People help a man suffering from heat exhaustion at a market in Karachi
People buy blocks of ice from a vendor along a Karachi road
Getting much needed relief in the form of water bottles and towels
Graveyards in the city of Karachi are demanding as much Rs 35,000 for a grave, saying the heatwave deaths have led to a sharp demand in space for graves.
