"How do I survive the next 12 hours?": Disability and lived experiences of extreme heat in the UK

As extreme heat becomes a more frequent consequence of climate change, understanding how marginalised populations experience it is critical for adaptation. Disabled people are routinely categorised as ‘at-risk’, yet research largely quantifies heat risk at population level, leaving lived dimensions of heat experience for Disabled people under-explored, particularly in the UK. Drawing on theories of ableism and psycho-emotional disablism, this qualitative study asks how Disabled people in the UK experience extreme heat and what shapes their capacity to adapt. We conducted semi-structured interviews with 27 self-identified Disabled adults across the UK between July and September 2025 and analysed data using Reflexive Thematic Analysis. Across three main themes, participants depict heat as an actively disabling environmental condition which erodes capacity, diminishes identity, exposes ableist assumptions in adaptation and is mediated by material and structural conditions across housing, care and urban infrastructure. Current adaptation frameworks contain significant blind spots, including the temporal and psycho-emotional dimensions of heat harm, and are, in some respects, actively harmful for Disabled people. Addressing this requires a fundamental interrogation of whose knowledge informs the design of heat adaptation policy in the UK.