Other countries have reported fatal incidents as well. In Spain, a 90-year-old woman reportedly died near Bilbao after suffering heatstroke in her nursing home, while a 68-year-old man in Almería was also reported to have died from heatstroke last week.
In Germany, at least seven people died in heatwave-related incidents. German police said at least two people died in separate swimming accidents in Berlin on Saturday. In another incident, a group in a rubber dinghy found an unresponsive man in Jungfernheideteich, a man-made lake in a public park in western Berlin. France reported at least 40 drowning deaths.
What heat does to the body
Garyfallos Konstantinoudis, a lecturer at the Grantham Institute for Climate Change and the Environment at Imperial College London, said heatwaves create serious health risks because they can overwhelm the body’s ability to cool itself.
“Heatwaves pose serious health dangers, primarily by causing heat stress, which occurs when the body struggles to regulate its temperature. This can lead to dehydration, heat exhaustion, and in severe cases, heatstroke, a medical emergency,” he told Al Jazeera.
Heatstroke occurs when the body’s core temperature rises above 40C and the body cannot cool down properly. Konstantinoudis said symptoms can include “high body temperature, confusion, loss of consciousness, rapid heartbeat, rapid breathing,” and can lead to organ failure or death without urgent treatment.
Heat stress can also trigger fatal heart attacks, strokes and respiratory failure. Older adults, people with disabilities, and people without reliable access to cooling or hydration face higher risks. That last category is doing a lot of work in a continent where many homes were built to hold warmth in, not keep summer heat out.
What is causing the current heatwave?
Meteorologists say this month’s extreme temperatures were driven by a heat dome, a large area of high pressure that formed over much of Western Europe.
Named for the Greek letter it resembles, the pattern forms when the jet stream bends and stalls instead of moving weather systems from west to east. In an omega block, that flow bends and stalls, trapping a ridge of high pressure between two low-pressure systems.
The result is a long stretch of hot, stagnant air sitting over the same region for days or even weeks. The effect is straightforward: the heat arrives, stays, and makes ordinary systems look suddenly fragile.
Scientists say human-caused climate change is making heatwaves far more frequent and more severe. Laurie Parsons, reader in human geography at Royal Holloway, University of London, said global average temperatures are now about 1.25C above pre-industrial levels. In 2024, they reached 1.55C above those levels.
“Heatwaves like we are seeing now are about 30 times more likely to happen than in the pre-climate change era,” Parsons told Al Jazeera. “Exceptional heatwaves like the current one would previously have been a once-in-a-300-year event but now occur more often than once a decade.”
How are European countries responding?
Historically, excess deaths during heatwaves were less common in much of Europe, particularly in the north and west, where summers were generally milder. Housing and public buildings were often designed around cold winters, with insulation and heat retention taking priority over cooling.
That approach is now colliding with a different climate reality. Governments and cities have started building heat-response systems, but unevenly, and often only after the latest emergency has begun.
Several measures are already in place or gaining ground:
- Paris and Denmark have expanded initiatives to monitor the welfare of elderly people.
- Barcelona has opened more than 500 climate shelters where residents can escape extreme heat.
- The European Trade Union Confederation has called on the European Commission to introduce a maximum working temperature law.
On June 25, Enrico Somaglia, general secretary of the European Federation of Food, Agriculture, and Tourism Trade Union, said climate change is already reshaping workplaces.
“Climate change is here and is profoundly affecting the world of work, threatening jobs and incomes in our sectors. It demands immediate action, through both mitigation and adaptation strategies,” he said. “We can’t accept another summer where legislators come with too little, too late. A binding EU directive on occupational heat is essential to keep workers safe.”
The issue was due to be discussed on Monday by the European Union Employment, Social Policy, Health and Consumer Affairs Council in Luxembourg.
Why air conditioning is not a complete answer
Some politicians are pushing more immediate cooling fixes. In France, Marine Le Pen, leader of the far-right National Rally party, has proposed a “massive air conditioning plan” that would install units in areas with more vulnerable populations if she comes to power.
Air conditioning can provide life-saving relief during extreme heat. The problem is that it can also deepen the longer-term crisis if powered by fossil-fuel-heavy electricity systems and polluting refrigerants. A fix that makes future heat worse is, medically speaking, awkward.
The United Nations Environment Programme says cooling could generate 10 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. Some cooling equipment, including refrigerators and air conditioners, uses hydrofluorocarbons, synthetic gases that pollute the atmosphere. Some warm the planet nearly 4,000 times more than carbon dioxide over a 20-year period, according to the agency.
Martin Krause, director of the climate change division at the United Nations Environment Programme, said cooling is still essential.
“Cooling is essential for the health and well-being of billions. The irony is that, right now, as current systems are highly polluting and energy-intensive, it’s making the problem with extreme heat worse, perpetuating a vicious cycle,” he said.
What should governments do next?
Joeri Rogelj, director of research at the Grantham Institute for Climate Change and the Environment, said emergency responses alone will not be enough because the heatwaves are being driven by rapidly rising global temperatures.
“The heatwaves we are experiencing are driven by rapidly rising global warming, which is in turn caused by greenhouse gas emissions from our economies. The response must therefore address both symptoms and causes,” he told Al Jazeera.
Rogelj said France should look beyond short-term measures by designing cooler cities with more trees and shade, supporting cooler homes, and protecting vulnerable people. But, he added, “without tackling the underlying warming trend, such measures will become increasingly insufficient. The priority must therefore also be to reduce climate pollution to the absolute minimum.”
The United Nations Environment Programme recommends pairing adaptation with emissions cuts, including:
- Expanding passive cooling through trees, shade and nature-based design.
- Updating urban planning so roads, buildings and infrastructure release heat rather than trap it.
- Phasing out fossil fuels and reducing the use of planet-warming refrigerants.
- Creating early warning systems for dangerous heat.
- Strengthening health systems and heat action plans.
- Investing in sustainable cooling programmes.
- Enforcing worker protections for outdoor labourers and others exposed to high temperatures.
- Reinforcing critical infrastructure such as power plants, hospitals and schools.
Europe’s latest heatwave is not just a weather story. It is a test of buildings, labour rules, health systems and political attention spans. The temperature is rising faster than the paperwork, and the death toll shows the cost of that delay.
