Climate collapse caused more than half of the 68,000 heat deaths during the scorching European summer of 2022. study has found.
Researchers from the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal) found that 38,000 fewer people would have died from the heat if humans had not clogged the atmosphere with pollutants that act like a greenhouse and pollute the planet. The death toll is about ten times greater than the number of people murdered in Europe that year.
“Many see climate change as a future problem,” says lead author Thessa Beck. “Yet our findings underline that it is already an urgent problem.”
The warm weather killed more women than men, more southern Europeans than northern Europeans, and more old people than young people. Scientists already knew that carbon pollution had made the heat waves hotter, but did not know how much this had driven up the death toll.
They found that 56% of heat-related deaths could have been prevented if the world had not warmed from burning fossil fuels and destroying nature. In the six years before that, the share fluctuated between 44% and 54%.
Even small increases in temperature can have devastating consequences for public health, says Emily Theokritoff, a researcher at Imperial College London who was not involved in the study. “This result makes sense: heat-related mortality increases rapidly as temperatures exceed the limits to which people are accustomed.”
Europe is warming twice as fast as the rest of the planet, but doctors warn that hospitals are unprepared for the consequences. The rise in temperatures is forcing more and more people to endure the scorching summer heat that sends their bodies into overdrive, even as it reduces exposure to the frigid winter cold that leaves them too weak to fight off illness.
Scientists predict that the lives lost by Europe’s warmer summers will outweigh those saved by cooler winters if the planet warms more than 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. Last week, the UN Environment Program warned that the world is on track to reach 3 degrees Celsius of warming by the end of the century.
The dangers of extreme heat are even greater in Africa, Asia and South America, but due to a lack of data, there have been limited studies on the effects on human health, Beck said.
“A common misconception is that only extreme temperatures pose a serious risk,” she said. “However, our study, along with previous research, shows that even moderate heat can lead to heat-related deaths, especially among more vulnerable populations.”
Scientists had previously used heat and health data from 35 European countries to estimate how many more people will die from hot weather. In the new study, they ran the model with temperatures for a hypothetical world in which humans had not warmed the planet.
They found that climate change was responsible for 22,501 heat deaths in women and 14,026 heat deaths in men.
Garyfallos Konstantinoudis, a researcher at Imperial College London who was not involved in the study, said the authors may have overestimated the effect of heat on mortality because they did not take into account how people had adapted.
He said: “Previous studies have reported a reduction in the impact on heat mortality over time, due to factors such as infrastructural changes and improved healthcare.”
To stay safe in the heat, doctors recommend drinking water, staying indoors during the hottest parts of the day, and caring for elderly neighbors and single family members. Governments can save lives by creating action plans for warm weather, designing cities with more green space and less concrete, and reducing pollution.
“Heat can be very dangerous for the heart, especially for older people,” says Beck.
