Roughly 1,000 excess deaths were reported in France between Wednesday and Saturday as temperatures in the country rose to their highest recorded levels, according to Santé Publique France, the national public health agency.
Excess deaths were particularly high in the west and center of the country, according to the agency, which compared the average daily death toll with that of the previous two months. Eighty-five percent of the dead were aged 65 or older, though increases were seen across all age groups, the agency said in a statement on Sunday.
The full toll may take months to calculate, but for now it is still far lower than the toll during a heat wave in 2003, when 15,000 people were estimated to have died. Definitive figures on excess mortality will not be known until December, because investigations must be conducted on the causes of each death, France’s health minister, Stéphanie Rist, said on Thursday.
Deaths during last week’s heat wave increased in hospitals and nursing homes, the health agency’s statement said, and “a particularly sharp increase in deaths at home has been observed,” especially in the Paris region.
“This observation serves as a reminder of the need for measures to support isolated individuals and those experiencing profound loneliness, including in highly urbanized areas,” the agency said.
Élisabeth Charrier, the head of the national funeral federation, told the French daily newspaper Le Figaro that “high activity” had been reported in the country’s mortuaries. “The pressure is concentrated in Paris,” Ms. Charrier said. “For the past two days, the only two facilities located within the city limits have been at full capacity.”
The heat wave in France and Europe last week was one of the most severe to hit the region, with temperatures exceeding 40 degrees Celsius, or 104 degrees Fahrenheit, for days. Temperatures in parts of France on Wednesday and Thursday were the highest ever recorded in the country, according to the country’s weather service.
The heat disrupted the train network, closed schools or limited their hours, brought a surge in air-conditioner sales and prompted some residents to cover windows with survival blankets or chalk.
A rise in swimming in rivers and other waterways brought additional deaths. On Saturday, France’s interior minister, Laurent Nuñez, said 74 people had died by drowning since June 18.
Though temperatures dropped over the weekend, more patients are expected to be treated in hospitals in the coming days, health officials said.
Dr. Agnès Ricard-Hibon, a spokeswoman for France’s emergency units, said in a radio interview on Monday, “During the very first days of the heat wave, we weren’t overwhelmed in the emergency rooms, because the human body adapts.” She added, “But after a certain amount of time, the ability to adapt is exceeded, and when the temperature rises like this, it leads to organ failure.”
Dr. Philippe Juvin, a conservative lawmaker and head of the emergency room at a Paris hospital, said in a broadcast interview on Sunday: “On Monday, housekeepers and caregivers who look after the elderly in their homes will return to work, as will families. And we will open the doors, and we will probably find people who are in very, very poor condition at home, who haven’t had anything to drink in three days, who are in the heat or who are dead.”
On Sunday, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director general of the World Health Organization, said on social media that more than 1,300 excess deaths “linked to high temperatures in Europe” had been recorded since June 21.
“Heat stress is often called the ‘silent killer’ — and European homes, workplaces and schools were not built for these temperatures,” he said. He added that his organization was “encouraging European countries to implement heat health action plans, as part of the broader agenda to protect health against climate change.”
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