More than 10,000 excess deaths were recorded across Europe during the record-breaking heatwave that swept western parts of the continent in late June, according to official data.
Figures released by EuroMOMO, a mortality monitoring network supported by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control and the World Health Organisation, showed that over 9,000 of the deaths were among people aged 65 and older.
Extreme heat can be fatal by triggering heat stroke or worsening cardiovascular and respiratory illnesses, with older adults among the most at risk.
“To have this kind of excess at this time of year is unusual. It’s really high,” Lasse Vestergaard, Chief Physician at Denmark’s Statens Serum Institut, which hosts EuroMOMO, told Reuters.
“It is difficult to explain this high excess mortality by anything but the extreme heat,” Vestergaard added.
Scientists said the late-June heatwave would have been “virtually impossible” without human-caused climate change, which is increasing the frequency and intensity of heatwaves.
The data, compiled from mortality statistics across 27 European countries, covered all-cause excess deaths, not just heat-related fatalities—for the week of June 22–28, when the heatwave reached its peak in France, Spain, Britain and several other countries.
Researchers said there were no other major known factors, such as COVID-19 outbreaks, that could account for the surge to 10,650 excess deaths during that week.
By comparison, combined mortality across the same countries had averaged about 500 fewer deaths per week than expected over the previous eight weeks. EuroMOMO noted that the figures could be updated as additional data becomes available.
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The late-June heatwave disrupted electricity supplies, forced school closures and shattered temperature records in France, Spain and the UK.
Although EuroMOMO does not provide country-specific excess death figures, it reported that France and Belgium were the only countries to register “very high excess” mortality during the final week of June.
Belgium’s public health institute, Sciensano, said the country’s excess mortality during the heatwave was the highest recorded since its records began in 2000.
A separate study published on Monday estimated that about 2,700 people died from heat-related causes in England and Wales during the May and June heatwaves.
The study, conducted by Imperial College London, the UK Met Office and the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, found that 42% of those deaths were linked to the additional heat caused by global warming.
