{"id":777110,"date":"2026-07-03T19:57:18","date_gmt":"2026-07-03T19:57:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/777110\/"},"modified":"2026-07-03T19:57:18","modified_gmt":"2026-07-03T19:57:18","slug":"extreme-heat-in-europe-why-climate-change-experts-warn-the-record-breaking-death-toll-is-a-window-into-the-future","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/777110\/","title":{"rendered":"Extreme heat in Europe: Why climate change experts warn the record-breaking death toll is a window into the future"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Last Wednesday as temperatures in England soared to 35 degrees, more than 12 degrees above average, the London School of Economics cancelled an event to discuss the impact of extreme heat due to the extreme heat.<\/p>\n

A heatwave, supercharged to its record-breaking extreme by global warming caused by the burning of fossil fuels, had settled over Europe under a dome of high pressure<\/a> and unleashed carnage across the continent. So-called \u201cred\u201d warnings had been issued in London alerting people to the threat of extreme heat.<\/p>\n

\"MeltedMelted bitumen on tram tracks in Leipzig.Alamy Stock Photo<\/p>\n

The event on June 24 was to have marked the start of London Climate Week. Its panel was to have included Professor Lord Nicholas Stern, a former World Bank chief economist, famous also as the author of the Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change.<\/p>\n

Apologising for the cancellation, the LSE explained that the venue it planned to hold the event in, known simply as the Old Building, did not have cooling mechanisms in place \u201clike most buildings in London\u201d and it would be unsafe to host a public gathering within its solid stone walls.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are living through a completely unprecedented period \u2013 a fact we must have the humility to acknowledge,\u201d France\u2019s President Emmanuel Macron told a press conference. \u201cWe have adapted to global warming, but there is no adapting to a peak unmatched in Europe today and unprecedented in our history, meaning a heatwave peak in which temperatures soar 15 degrees above seasonal averages for such a prolonged period.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"PeoplePeople with parasols queuing outside a shop in London on June 26.AP Photo\/Kirsty Wigglesworth<\/p>\n

The World Health Organisation warned that extreme heat would become increasingly common. \u201cEurope is warming at more than twice the global average. Heatwaves are no longer one-off freak events,\u201d it said. \u201cEvery summer we fail to prepare for them is a summer we pay for in lives.\u201d<\/p>\n

Spain\u2019s Carlos III Health Institute said in a report that there were at least 1028 heat-related deaths in the final days of June, and it is now bracing for temperatures of up to 44 degrees this weekend.<\/p>\n

As health authorities are not equipped to quickly report heat deaths, and because elderly victims who die alone at home can go unreported for days or even weeks, the death toll is likely to be over 20,000, according to one analysis.<\/p>\n

A rapid modelling study by Dr Christopher Callahan<\/a>, a climate scientist at Indiana University, estimates that heat probably killed more than 20,000 people, with more than 5000 excess deaths in France, 4500 in Germany, more than 3000 in Spain, 2700 in Italy, 1070 in Poland and 862 in the UK between June 22 and June 28.<\/p>\n

\"AnAn airconditioning unit in the doorway of a restaurant in Toulouse, France.Bloomberg<\/p>\n

The disaster is, he says, is a \u201cwindow into the future\u201d.<\/p>\n

Callahan\u2019s study<\/a>, which is not yet peer-reviewed, uses statistical analysis of excess deaths rather than reports of deaths from health authorities.<\/p>\n

But the impact so far has gone far beyond deaths and injuries.<\/p>\n

In Germany, which broke its all-time temperature record on three consecutive days, joint seals in tram tracks melted<\/a> in the city of Leipzig, halting public transport. In France, rivers became too hot for nuclear power plants <\/a>to safely discharge heated water into, so power production was cut as demand shot up. Schools across Germany, France, Spain and the UK were closed.<\/p>\n

\"AA man sits in the shade during a heatwave in the City of London on June 24, the same day the London School of Economics cancelled its event on extreme heat.Bloomberg<\/p>\n

With hundreds of thousands of chickens dying in the heat, carcass collection services were overwhelmed in France, Reuters reported. The cost to agriculture is not yet clear.<\/p>\n

Back in London, half an hour\u2019s drive from the LSE\u2019s cancelled forum, another event went ahead in a far larger and thoroughly air-conditioned venue. This was the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship\u2019s conference, a growing annual gathering of conservative and right politicians and commentators.<\/p>\n

Among ARC\u2019s primary concerns is the defence of what it calls Western civilisation and the fight against climate action, which it considers to be a waste of money.<\/p>\n

Addressing the crowd, Nigel Farage, leader of the far-right party Reform, now leading UK polls, thought the heatwave \u2013 by then hitting more than 150 million people \u2013 was a tremendous wheeze.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m amazed to see so many people here. Don\u2019t you know there\u2019s a red warning? We\u2019re in the red zone! Schools have all closed! No one\u2019s going to work! There\u2019s a danger to life!\u201d he said at the start of an on-stage conversation.<\/p>\n

\"AA flag vendor rests in the shade during high temperatures in Albania on June 30 .Bloomberg<\/p>\n

He went on to attack both UK Labour and the Conservatives for their support for their climate action policies. \u201cThe Tories even wrote net zero into law, and they shouldn\u2019t be forgiven for it, in my opinion,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Farage\u2019s party rejects the scientific consensus on climate change, as does the emboldened new right across Europe and in Donald Trump\u2019s America. During the ARC conference, which was attended by conservative figures from around the world, including Tony Abbott and Peta Credlin, Scott Morrison and Barnaby Joyce, when climate change was mentioned it was generally as a punchline.<\/p>\n

Related Article\"Young<\/a><\/p>\n

There\u2019s little sign that the terrible death toll will shift the hardening views of conservatives against climate action, even as a new heat wave builds in Europe and another builds in the United States.<\/p>\n

Rather than address the link between fossil fuels and the rapidly mounting death toll this week, conservatives blamed progressives for opposing the deployment of air-conditioners.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is high time that France rolled out a major air-conditioning equipment plan,\u201d the French far-right leader Marine Le Pen said in post on X<\/a>. She blamed the French \u201cso-called elites\u201d for leaving ordinary people to suffer in the heat while they enjoyed air-conditioning.<\/p>\n

\u201cHospitals, schools, nursing homes, public transport, etc., are not equipped, even though these places host French people who are particularly vulnerable to the heat.\u201d<\/p>\n

The failure of serious debate led one German commentator to lament that like floods, heatwaves are now natural disasters,<\/a> \u201cwith the difference that when there\u2019s flooding, every politician pulls out their rubber boots and speaks affectedly into cameras and microphones. But when it\u2019s hot, [conservative politician] Markus S\u00f6der posts a picture of himself at an outdoor pool and says: \u2018Swimming helps when it\u2019s hot.\u2019 Seriously?\u201d<\/p>\n

Richard Black, the Berlin-based climate analyst and author of the book Denied: The Rise and Fall of Climate Contrarianism, says it\u2019s clear why some leaders would rather engage in a culture war over cooling infrastructure in the face of such an enormous long-predicted catastrophe. \u201cIt\u2019s definitely better for the fossil fuel industry, and it\u2019s also better for politicians and think tanks, aka lobby groups, who oppose the clean energy transition. Because we\u2019re not then talking about the energy transition, we\u2019re talking about air-conditioners.\u201d<\/p>\n

Related Article\"A<\/a><\/p>\n

He doesn\u2019t expect much to change in the near future either. Though conservatives championed climate and environmental protection \u2013 with Nixon and Reagan pushing for clean air and marine policy, and Thatcher leading the push for climate action \u2013 the emerging hard right sneers at such policy.<\/p>\n

With no pressure from their opponents to act, progressive leaders have been allowed to backslide in their ambition.<\/p>\n

On the last day of the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship conference, Abbott ended his speech, a criticism of black armband history, with the words, \u201cWe call this ARC. There was another ark, a biblical one that saved humanity, and maybe that\u2019s our challenge too.\u201d<\/p>\n

Outside, a small group of Christian protesters waited in the heat, one holding a banner with a quote from Pope Francis emblazoned upon it: \u201cListen to the Cry of the Earth and the Cry of the Poor \u2013 Protect Our Common Home.\u201d<\/p>\n

Get to the heart of what\u2019s happening with climate change and the environment. Sign up for our fortnightly Environment newsletter.<\/a><\/p>\n

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\"NickNick O’Malley<\/a> is National Environment and Climate Editor for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age. He is also a senior writer and a former US correspondent.Connect via email<\/a>.From our partners<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Save You have reached your maximum number of saved items. Remove items from your saved list to add…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":777111,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[64,63,75,128],"class_list":["post-777110","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-environment","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/777110","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=777110"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/777110\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/777111"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=777110"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=777110"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=777110"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}