Ontario legislation that mandated air conditioning in all resident rooms in long-term care (LTC) homes has saved dozens of lives, according to a new study.

“Air conditioning is no longer a luxury. It is actually an essential health need,” said lead author Nathan Stall, the geriatrics lead at Sinai Health, whose study was published this week in the medical journal JAMA Internal Medicine.

The two year study looked at 73,578 resident deaths in Ontario between 2010 and 2023. It found residents in nursing homes without air conditioning in their rooms had an eight per cent higher chance of dying in extreme heat days compared with residents of homes with air conditioning, especially as as extreme heat “poses a serious health risk to older adults.”