AFP analysis links Europe's June heatwave to at least 12,000 excess deaths

An AFP analysis of national statistics indicated that at least 12,000 excess deaths were recorded across nine European countries during June's heatwave, and the toll could still rise as more data is released. All-time temperature records were broken in several European countries, and June temperature records were broken in the UK and Switzerland. The mortality figures remain provisional, but the analysis said they give an early indication of the human cost of record heatwaves that are becoming more common.

AFP analysed excess deaths between June 22 and 28 in Belgium, France, Germany, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Spain and Switzerland. Around 10,000 excess deaths were recorded in those countries during that period, which was the height of the heatwave in several places. Britain's Met Office estimated another 2,200 deaths linked to the heatwave in England and Wales between June 18 and 28.

Provisional data from the European Mortality Monitoring project, or EuroMOMO, also showed a significant rise in excess deaths in the final week of June. EuroMOMO put the figure at 14,260, using official statistics from 24 countries that together account for about 400 million residents. Its figures do not include parts of eastern Europe.

The figures indicate that the week had the highest rate of excess deaths for any June week since EuroMOMO began compiling these European figures in 2020. The only summer week with a higher excess-death rate over that seven-year period was a week in July 2022, when Covid was still active in many European countries.

Hans Henri P. Kluge, the World Health Organization's regional director for Europe, warned that the summer was not yet over. He said heat should be treated as a health emergency rather than only as a weather event, and said tools, guidance and evidence exist to prevent many deaths.

Lasse Vestergaard, an epidemiologist at Denmark's Statens Serum Institut and coordinator of EuroMOMO, said there was no other known reason for the excess mortality than heat. He also urged caution in interpreting the newest figures, saying EuroMOMO estimates take four weeks to become sufficiently consolidated. The source said initial figures released by national bodies have often been revised upward since the end of the June heatwave.

Countries compile the relevant figures in different ways. Spain's MoMo excess mortality monitor attributed 610 deaths to heat between June 22 and 28, with nearly two thirds of them among people older than 85. Germany recorded 5,780 excess deaths over the same period compared with the average of the four previous years, according to the federal statistics office Destatis. Compared with the two previous weeks, Destatis recorded 7,100 excess deaths. Germany's Robert Koch Institute said more people had died from heat so far this summer in Germany than over the previous six years.

France recorded 2,025 excess deaths between June 22 and 28 compared with the previous week. Belgium's public health body Sciensano recorded 1,747 excess deaths between June 18 and July 1, including 750 over June 27 and 28 alone. Public health data analysed by AFP showed nearly 600 excess deaths in the Netherlands, 220 in Switzerland and 23 in Luxembourg between June 22 and 28.

Italy's health authorities recorded a slight rise in deaths among people over 85 in northern Italy between June 24 and 30, but those figures covered only the 54 main cities there. Several central and eastern European countries hit by the late-June heatwave, including Hungary and Slovakia, had not yet published provisional figures. The World Weather Attribution group of scientists said the temperatures would have been virtually impossible in June without climate change.