Heat waves in Europe killed more than 61,600 people last summer, a study estimates
Heat waves in Europe killed more than 61,000 people — most of them women — last summer, according to an estimate published in the journal Nature on Monday.
The summer of 2022 was the continent's hottest on record. Officials tallied thousands of "excess deaths" during that period, and this study specifically analyzes how many were a result of the heat.
Researchers analyzed data from the Eurostat mortality database for 35 countries to estimate that 61,672 people died from heat-related illness between May 30 and September 4. Italy, Spain and Germany had the highest number of heat-attributable deaths overall.
The staggering figure suggests that European countries are struggling to adapt to the effects of climate change, even in the wake of a deadly 2003 heat wave that caused more than 70,000 excess deaths across the continent.
The disaster led many countries () to implement heat prevention plans and other adaptation strategies aimed at protecting vulnerable populations, the study says, though "the evidence of their effectiveness is still limited."
