{"id":45816,"date":"2026-06-25T11:29:28","date_gmt":"2026-06-25T11:29:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/45816\/"},"modified":"2026-06-25T11:29:28","modified_gmt":"2026-06-25T11:29:28","slug":"the-first-heatwave-of-the-year-in-spain-has-claimed-212-lives-hottest-days-since-1950","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/45816\/","title":{"rendered":"The first heatwave of the year in Spain has claimed 212 lives: Hottest days since 1950"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Daily Mortality Monitoring System (MoMo) estimates that during the first heatwave<\/a> of the year, which began last Sunday and is easing off this today, Thursday, there have been 212 deaths<\/a> linked to high temperatures, with the central and northern regions being the worst affected.<\/p>\n

The day with the highest excess mortality was yesterday, Wednesday, which accounted for almost half of the deaths (96), whilst on Tuesday and Wednesday \u2013 the hottest days recorded in Spain<\/a> for this month since at least 1950, according to the State Meteorological Agency (Aemet) \u2013 there were 66 and 38 deaths respectively. On Sunday, there were 13.<\/p>\n

These are preliminary figures and we will have to wait a week for them to become more stable, Diana G\u00f3mez, a scientist at the National Centre for Epidemiology (CNE) who manages this tool, told EFE. The tool does not measure actual deaths but produces a statistical projection by cross-referencing observed daily mortality with the expected mortality for that period and temperature data.<\/p>\n

However, the initial data reveal that \u201cthere has been a significant spike\u201d over the last four days of June, a month which has provisionally recorded 380 deaths due to high temperatures, more than half (55 per cent) of which occurred during the heatwave that ends today.<\/p>\n

These figures would thus be added to those from last May, when 101 deaths linked to extreme heat were recorded \u2013 the highest figure for that month in the entire historical series. By region, the excess mortality curve is most pronounced in the central and northern regions: 43 in Catalonia, 32 in Castile and Le\u00f3n, 30 in the Basque Country, 28 in Madrid, 18 in Andalusia, 13 in Navarre and Aragon, 11 in Castile-La Mancha, 8 in the Valencian Community, 7 in Asturias, 5 in Galicia and 3 in Cantabria, Extremadura and La Rioja.<\/p>\n

Heatwaves are arriving earlier and earlier, experts warn, and although there are as yet no conclusive results, a study currently being finalised by the CNE suggests that \u201cthe earlier they begin, the greater their impact on mortality\u201d, G\u00f3mez revealed. It has also been established that the heat kills the most vulnerable in particular, exacerbating pre-existing conditions; in fact, 200 of the deaths estimated by the MoMo for this period occurred among people over 65, particularly those over 85, a group totalling 148.<\/p>\n

Another record set this June is that, for the first time, minimum temperatures have exceeded 30 degrees, and for several consecutive nights at that, with the nights of the 22nd and 23rd being the warmest recorded this month. The impact of sweltering nights on mortality is not measured by MoMo but, according to G\u00f3mez, \u201cwe need to start working in that direction\u201d, as there are already studies highlighting the influence of night-time temperatures on health.<\/p>\n

According to research published this week in the journal Nature Climate Change<\/a>, led by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (UK), night-time temperatures have risen even faster than daytime temperatures: the ten warmest nights of each year have warmed at a global average rate of 0.32 degrees per decade, compared with 0.27 degrees for daytime temperatures.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Daily Mortality Monitoring System (MoMo) estimates that during the first heatwave of the year, which began last…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":45817,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1254,1512,18078,18076,16233,20148,4496,605,599,15403,7641,600,17,603],"class_list":["post-45816","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-spain","tag-balearics","tag-climate-change","tag-deaths","tag-fatalities","tag-global-warming","tag-health-warning","tag-heatwave","tag-latest-headlines","tag-majorca","tag-majorca-heat","tag-majorca-weather-alert","tag-mallorca","tag-spain","tag-summer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45816","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45816"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45816\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45817"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45816"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45816"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45816"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}