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In the Rio Grande Valley, some older Texans are getting through the summer by shutting off their air conditioning at night and relying on a fan.
Public Health Watch reported that many people across the region are rationing AC because they cannot afford to keep it running, a dangerous decision in hot weather.
Here’s what to know
A $600 power bill forced 80-year-old retired mechanic Arturo Gómez of Rio Grande City and his wife to cut back, and even in August they kept the AC off from 9 p.m. until 9 a.m.
“We either pay the electric bill or we eat,” Gómez told his wife, per Public Health Watch.
The outlet reported that summer at-home deaths among people 75 and older in Cameron, Hidalgo, Starr, and Willacy counties have tripled over the last 20 years.
Public Health Watch found that the rise far outpaces the 68% increase in the region’s older population over the same period.
It noted that average summer temperatures in the Valley generally range from 95 to over 100 degrees. In McAllen, temperatures are up 4.4 degrees from the 1970s, while Texas’ average electricity price has increased about 30% since 2021.
More background
Eric Panzer, medical director at Valley Regional Medical Center’s emergency department, told Public Health Watch that older adults face greater heat risk because aging makes it harder for the body to cool down; conditions such as diabetes and hypertension can make that danger worse.
“They are much more fragile, and they are not able to tolerate it. Their bodies don’t have the same ability to compensate as young patients,” Panzer said.
A 2020 study in Houston found that older adults were 11% more likely to die of heat-related illness when indoor temperatures rose by 9 degrees, per Public Health Watch.
The population tends to live with “some form of chronic disease,” said Cassie O’Lenick, the study’s lead author and an environmental epidemiologist. “When your internal core body temperature heats up to dangerous levels, it impacts a lot of these different organ systems, and so if you have underlying disease, it’s going to exacerbate it.”
Public Health Watch reported that Rene Perez, director of patient transport services at the South Texas Emergency Care Foundation, found an elderly couple dead inside a dangerously hot home in Harlingen after a July 2024 911 call.
A family member told him the couple had gone without air conditioning because they could not afford it. “To me that is the sad part, because that probably shouldn’t have happened,” Perez told Public Health Watch.
What’s being done?
The outlet noted that the primary safety net is the federal Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program, but Victoria Arredondo, program manager at the Community Action Corp. of South Texas, and Jaime Longoria, executive director of the Hidalgo County Community Service Agency, said need far exceeds available funding.
“We don’t have the funds to help everybody,” Arredondo told Public Health Watch.
According to Arredondo, about 42,000 households in Cameron and Willacy counties qualify for assistance, but CACOST reached less than 8% of them in 2025.
Jaime Longoria, the agency’s executive director, said more than 100,000 families in Hidalgo County qualify for utility assistance, but the Hidalgo County Community Service Agency gets funding for only about 8,000 families.
Public Health Watch also reported that the South Texas Emergency Care Foundation has launched its Community Health Paramedicine program to identify residents without AC or those who need help with utility bills. Doug Hairgrove, who directs CACOST’s weatherization program and Community Action Comprehensive Energy Assistance Program, said weatherizing a home can save a family about $300 a year, though that also requires money that people may not have.
According to Public Health Watch, assistance may be available through CACOST, the Hidalgo County Community Service Agency, and utilities’ Customer Assistance and Relief for Energy programs or by calling 211 for more information.
“Running the AC 24 hours per day, it’s just a bunch of money,” Gómez said.
Where can I learn more?
What’s happening to older Texans in the Rio Grande Valley reflects a wider problem. Extreme heat is getting worse, the power system faces heavy demand in summer, and air conditioning is expensive.
• Across Texas, deadly heat domes are becoming more common, pushing vulnerable residents into greater danger.
• Texas’ grid held through brutal summer as renewables softened the blow during peak demand.
• In France, air conditioning is reshaping a long-running climate and public health debate.
The Valley’s crisis sits where worsening heat, household finances, and the need for reliable cooling meet.
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