More than 24,000 people died because of extreme heat in 854 cities across Europe this summer, scientists have found. And around 68 percent of them would still be alive if it weren’t for the influence of climate change.
That’s according to a sobering new study released Wednesday. And it’s not even a comprehensive picture of what happened in Europe this summer, according to its authors, who hail from the Imperial College London, the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine and the University of Bern in Switzerland.
Their study only examined cities in the EU with at least 50,000 residents — accounting for about 30 percent of the continent’s population. Some regions, like the Balkans, weren’t represented at all.
But the research does provide a stark warning about the dangers of extreme heat on the world’s fastest-warming continent.
