New Delhi: As North America gears up to host the FIFA World Cup 2026, an international group of doctors, physicians and sports scientists wrote to the international football association on 13 May, urging them to change their guidelines to alleviate heat stress experienced by the players.
The letter laid out a series of recommendations, from increasing the duration of cooling breaks in between matches to reducing the wet bulb globe temperature threshold for cancelling matches, to align with heat management protocols.
“Competitive exercise in hot environments can lead to a range of problems from impaired performance and enforced alterations in game strategy, to the medical emergency of heat stroke,” said Mike Tipton, Extreme Environments Lab, University of Portsmouth, and one of the signatories of the letter.
The FIFA Men’s World Cup 2026 is scheduled to take place from 11 June to 19 July, across various stadiums in the United States, Canada, and Mexico. The letter explained how extreme temperatures could have health implications for the players. In 2022, when the World Cup was scheduled to be held in Qatar, its dates were changed from summer to winter to avoid heat stress on players.
The study measured heat stress using the wet bulb globe temperature (WBGT), which is a public heat stress index that combines the temperature, humidity levels, wind speed, and solar radiation. It is often used by military personnel to determine adequate conditions for training.
According to a study in the International Journal of Biometeorology published in 2025, 14 out of 16 match locations for the 2026 World Cup, the wet bulb globe temperatures are supposed to exceed 28 degrees Celsius. In such conditions, the signatories of the letter said that it is not advisable to conduct high-exertion activities like football.
Currently, FIFA’s health guidelines say that a wet bulb temperature of more than 32 degrees Celsius would mandate cooling breaks during a match, but the decision to cancel the match based on temperature rests with the organisers.
“While we can expect from professional athletes higher resilience compared to the baseline population, the safety level of 32°C for activities involving running is impossible to justify,” the letter read.
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The recommended guidelines
The letter recommends that the threshold of wet bulb temperature should be reduced to 26 degrees Celsius for FIFA matches, since beyond that even well-trained athletes are unable to maintain their body’s thermal balance during high-intensity exercise. Moreover, if it exceeds 28 degrees Celsius, FIFA should take steps to postpone or reschedule the match.
The letter also talks about how currently, the “cooling breaks” in between matches are only for three minutes, which is not long enough for real-term body impact.
“The three-minute breaks that FIFA has adopted for all matches are too short to have a meaningful impact on rehydration and body cooling,” the petitioners wrote.
Taking the example of the International Cycling Union and the International Federation of Professional Footballers’ Associations (FIFPRO), the letter said that FIFA should increase the length of cooling breaks in between matches to at least six minutes. It added that FIFA should ensure that all locker rooms have the correct equipment to enable the pre-match and half-time cooling needs of the players.
“Player health and safety must remain the non-negotiable foundation of football governance and the heat risks for the upcoming World Cup,” the letter said.
(Edited by Insha Jalil Waziri)