New Jersey recently took a decisive step to confront a growing public health crisis, passing legislation (A3458) to pilot a Code Red alert system that shelters at-risk residents during extreme heat and air quality emergencies.
This bill reflects a troubling reality: Extreme heat is predictable, deadly, and demands action. Its impact is also largely invisible, unfolding quietly as the lives of housing-insecure communities are threatened.
By passing legislation to pilot a Code Red alert system, New Jersey acknowledged that extreme heat events demand more than warnings; they necessitate action.
New York faces the same danger without the same response, a failure that cost hundreds of lives last summer alone.
The scale of the problem is already clear. In 2025, the New York state Department of Health reported that upstate counties experienced unusually high temperatures, with 66% of days from May to September reaching a heat index of over 85 degrees Fahrenheit.
Extreme heat exposes a lack of access to health care. It festers in unsafe housing conditions and aggravates chronic illnesses, putting vulnerable New Yorkers at far higher risk of contracting potentially deadly heat-related illnesses. Without a coordinated response, these factors compound, making heat a deadly emergency without widespread recognition.
In New York City alone, more than 500 people die from extreme heat every summer. Heat-related illness rates are even higher in many upstate regions, with illness rates as high as 16.5 and 15.2 cases per 100,000 people. These are not abstract projections; they are lives lost to a predictable, preventable public health emergency.
Despite this reality, New York lacks a uniform system for responding to extreme heat. A Code Red policy would fill that gap.
Modeled after Code Blue, New York’s extreme cold mandate, Code Red would establish the infrastructure and funding for cooling centers statewide. It would ensure that housing-insecure populations are safe during heat crises.
We have a precedent to follow in Code Blue. This policy already requires collaboration among state agencies and localities to protect housing-insecure individuals during extreme cold. It ensures that shelters are accessible, staffed and safe, and that at-risk individuals are identified before tragedy strikes. A Code Red policy would apply this proven logic to extreme heat.
Extreme heat is a public health crisis affecting real New Yorkers in real time. Without a coordinated response, the toll will continue to rise quietly, predictably and unjustly. Code Red offers a chance to change course. By formalizing how we prepare for and respond to extreme heat, New York could reduce health care costs associated with heat-induced illnesses, advance equity in public health and save lives.
Temperatures are rising in the summer. The housing crisis is worsening. The policy solution is ready. New York must act now to protect vulnerable populations in extreme cold and extreme heat emergencies.
Madeleine Cierski is an analyst at the State Policy Advocacy Clinic in the Brooks School of Public Policy at Cornell University.