Australia has been urged to follow Spain's lead and start naming heatwaves so people grasp how lethal and disruptive they can be.
Heatwaves are Australia's deadliest natural hazard and climate change means they are now more frequent, more intense and last longer.
But experts say people have been slow to fully understand how dangerous they are, and it might be time to start naming them, like cyclones, to emphasise the risks.
Renew — a group that campaigns for more sustainable homes — has looked at what Spain is doing to combat extreme heat.
Seville became the first in the world in 2022 to begin naming its worst heatwaves, which are also categorised under a three-tiered rating system that reflects their severity.
Crucially, expected health impacts are factored into those ratings, alongside more traditional benchmarks like anticipated temperatures, and humidity.
“In Spain, improved public understanding of the dangers of heatwaves, coupled with a national heatwave plan, has helped save lives,” Renew's Rob McLeod said.
Heatwave expert Sarah Perkins-Kirkpatrick, from the University of NSW, thinks naming heatwaves might prompt the kind of psychological gear shift that's needed to get people planning and thinking about how they manage risks to their safety and wellbeing, like they might before a cyclone.
"We do need to take it more seriously and anything that helps people do that is the right thing to do," she said.
The Bureau of Meteorology's heatwave warning service already ranks heatwaves under a three-tiered system that labels them low-intensity, severe and extreme.
BOM says it works closely with health and emergency services, but "due to the complex nature of heatwaves, there are no current plans to name heatwaves in Australia".