Multitudes perished due to heat intensified by global warming this past season
In a groundbreaking study published this week, a team of epidemiologists and climate scientists from Imperial College London and the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine have estimated that climate change was responsible for approximately 16,500 additional deaths in Europe this summer.
The research, which focused on 854 cities with over 50,000 people in the EU and the U.K., representing about 30% of Europe's population, found that these heat-related deaths account for 68% of the estimated 24,400 such deaths that occurred in large European cities this summer.
The study revealed that Italy and Spain were the most severely affected, with climate change contributing to an estimated 4,597 additional heat-related deaths in Italy and 2,841 in Spain.
Extreme heat, particularly in the summer months, puts older people and those with underlying health conditions, such as heart disease and diabetes, at higher risk. Shockingly, people aged 65 and over accounted for 85% of the estimated excess heat-related deaths this summer.
The researchers emphasized that heat waves are known as silent killers, and an increasing temperature of 2 to 4 degrees Celsius can mean the difference between life and death for thousands of people.
Malcolm Mistry, an assistant professor at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, stated that these deaths are preventable if countries continue to reduce their emissions and combat climate change. Garyfallos Konstantinoudis, a lecturer at the Grantham Institute for Climate Change, echoed this sentiment, stating that the numbers represent real people who have lost their lives due to extreme heat.
The study also found that although excess mortality rates are lower in northern Europe, the proportion of deaths attributable to climate change is higher. This is due to the fact that climate change has made Europe's largest cities, on average, 2.2 degrees Celsius warmer compared to a pre-industrial world.
This summer was the third hottest on record, as reported by the EU's Copernicus Climate Change Service. The researchers hope that their findings will serve as a wake-up call for policymakers and the public to take urgent action against climate change to prevent further heat-related deaths in the future.
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