Inequality causing 100,000 extra deaths a year from heat and cold in Europe

The findings come after the EU’s Copernicus monitoring project ranked last month as the third-hottest April on record globally, with some countries such as Spain recording their hottest April on record. The return of the natural heating phenomenon El Niño – which may shape up to be unusually strong – has raised fears of a brutal European summer in 2026.

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The research is the first to quantify the effect of socioeconomic troubles on the lives lost during Europe’s bone-chillingly cold winters and scorchingly hot summers. The researchers said it added weight to calls to target short-term relief to vulnerable groups and, in the longer-term, reduce structural inequality in Europe.

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Heat and cold stress the body, leaving it more susceptible to disease and less able to fight it off. Mortality rises sharply when temperatures deviate from a comfortable range, particularly among people who are old or ill. The analysis, which looked at daily mortality data for 654 regions in Europe between 2000 and 2019, estimated “attributable deaths” by modelling the health burden if all regions had the best and worst values they found for each economic indicator.

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Cold is currently a far greater threat to human health than heat, though scientists project that relationship will flip as global heating pushes temperatures higher. Last month, scientists found temperatures in Europe have risen by 0.56C per decade since the mid-1990s – faster than any other continent on the planet – owing to the blanket of fossil fuel pollution covering the Earth.