(Paris) Nearly 50,000 people died in Europe due to heat in 2023, a level that is at the high end of the past decade, according to an annual study on the subject published Monday.
“We estimate that 47,690 deaths […] were linked to heat in 2023, a mortality rate that ranks second for the period 2015-2023 after the year 2022,” summarizes this study published in the journal Nature Medicine.
Carried out each year by teams from the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), this work concluded last year that the heat had been particularly deadly in 2022 with more than 60,000 deaths in Europe.
The accuracy of these figures must, however, be put into perspective. For 2023, researchers estimate that the number of deaths is most likely between nearly 30,000 and just over 65,000.
It is important to remember that the heat continued to cause many deaths – mainly among the elderly – in 2023, the summer of which was the second hottest ever recorded in Europe.
These episodes of intense heat, the frequency of which is exacerbated by global warming, have logically mainly weighed down the mortality rate in southern European countries (Greece, Italy, etc.), but have also affected more unusual regions such as the Baltic countries.
In France, the study attributes around 3,500 deaths to heat, slightly less than the figure given by the French public health agency a few months ago.
The study, which compiles data from 35 countries, also estimates that the number of deaths would have been even higher without adequate measures by governments to respond to the heat.
As its authors point out, many European countries took the measure of the danger during the heatwave of 2003. It is estimated that this killed 70,000 people in Europe, even if it is difficult to compare this figure precisely with estimates for the current period, for methodological reasons.
The authors see this drop in mortality as a positive effect of the heat preparedness plans now in force, even if they believe that these policies cannot be sufficient in themselves and will necessarily have to be accompanied by more proactive measures in the fight against global warming.