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As temperatures soar above 40 degrees Celsius across the Australian state of Victoria this week, new figures have revealed an alarming number of children being left in hot cars.
Statistics released by Ambulance Victoria on Thursday showed they were called to 1,531 statewide cases -- over an 11-month period -- of children left unattended in a car by their parent or guardian, a rate of almost five a day.
Of those calls to the emergency services, 88 percent were for children under the age of four.
Over Australia's summer months, where the temperatures frequently hit above 40 degrees Celsius, the temperature inside can climb as high as 60 to 70 degrees inside an idle car in the space of an hour.
In a well-publicized media stunt earlier this month, Australian celebrity chief Matt Moran showed the oven-like conditions encountered by these children, cooking a large piece of meat in a parked car.
Often heat-stressed kids have to be treated by paramedics once freed, and in the most extreme cases some children have died.
The disturbing figures came with a blunt warning from Ambulance Victoria's director of emergency management Paul Holman.
"Tragically we've seen three children die in recent years after being left in a car on a hot day," Holman told Fairfax Media on Thursday.
"It's clear that leaving children in a car could prove deadly, yet people don't seem to understand the risks," he said.
