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Spanish heat deaths rise tenfold year-on-year

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A pensioner reaches for a bottle of water, as he sits in his wheelchair in the shade outside his nursing home, during a recent heatwave in Seville. /Jon Nazca/Reuters
A pensioner reaches for a bottle of water, as he sits in his wheelchair in the shade outside his nursing home, during a recent heatwave in Seville. /Jon Nazca/Reuters

A pensioner reaches for a bottle of water, as he sits in his wheelchair in the shade outside his nursing home, during a recent heatwave in Seville. /Jon Nazca/Reuters

High temperatures caused 1,180 deaths in Spain in the past two months, a sharp increase from the same period last year, the country's Environment Ministry has announced.

The vast majority of people who died were over 65 and more than half were women, the data it cited showed.

The most affected regions were Galicia, La Rioja, Asturias and Cantabria – all located in the northern half of the country, where traditionally cooler summer temperatures have seen a significant rise in recent years.

Like other countries in Western Europe, Spain has been hit by extreme heat in recent weeks, with temperatures often topping 40 degrees Celsius.

People use umbrellas next to a thermometer displaying 47 Celsius degrees (116.6 Fahrenheit degrees) during the heatwave in Seville. /Marcelo del Pozo/Reuters
People use umbrellas next to a thermometer displaying 47 Celsius degrees (116.6 Fahrenheit degrees) during the heatwave in Seville. /Marcelo del Pozo/Reuters

People use umbrellas next to a thermometer displaying 47 Celsius degrees (116.6 Fahrenheit degrees) during the heatwave in Seville. /Marcelo del Pozo/Reuters

The 1,180 people who died of heat-related causes between May 16 and July 13 compared with 114 in the same period in 2024, the ministry said in a statement citing data from the Carlos III Health Institute. The number of deaths increased significantly in the first week in July.

The data shows an event "of exceptional intensity, characterized by an unprecedented increase in average temperatures and a significant increase in mortality attributable to heatwaves", the ministry said.

In the period the data covers, there were 76 red alerts for extreme heat, compared with none a year earlier.

Last summer, 2,191 deaths were attributed to heat-related causes in Spain, according to data from the Carlos III Health Institute.

The data from Spain follows a rapid scientific analysis published on July 9 that said around 2,300 people died of heat-related causes across 12 European cities during a severe heatwave in the 10 days to July 2.

It was not immediately clear whether the study conducted by scientists at Imperial College London and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine was using the same methodology as the Spanish data.

Source(s): Reuters
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