Kim Krisberg | Public Health Watch

Nearly 300,000 people in Texas have the life-threatening, life-altering neurological disease. It’s expensive to treat, so health insurance is crucial, although often out of reach.

“Nobody’s making a big enough deal about this,” said Dr. Irene Stafford, an OB-GYN and maternal-fetal medicine specialist in Houston. “What will it take? Where is the funding, where are the big media campaigns? …We have babies dying from something 100% preventable, so where is the big response?”

There is no heat standard at the federal level, with the exception of the military, though advocates have lobbied the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration to adopt one for years.