Germany unprepared for extreme heat that killed over 5,000 people
Since the beginning of 2026, at least 5,120 people have died in Germany due to the heat. The majority of deaths occurred during a wave of abnormal heat that covered the country and other European states for more than a week at the end of June.
Deutsche Welle reported the new data, citing the Robert Koch Institute. The agency noted that about 4,270 of the deceased were people aged 75 and older. According to experts, elderly people remain the most vulnerable category during prolonged periods of high temperatures.
Scale of the tragedy
At the end of June, air temperature in some regions of Germany exceeded 40 degrees. Many buildings in the country, including hospitals and nursing homes, are not equipped with air conditioning systems, as they were designed without taking into account such extreme heat.
On the same day, the Climate Change Service of the “Copernicus” program reported that June 2026 became the hottest on record in the history of observations in the European Union. The average temperature was more than 3 degrees higher than the 1991–2020 average.
Record temperature
Similar consequences of the heat were recorded in other EU countries as well. France also reported thousands of additional deaths, while Spain, the Netherlands, and Belgium reported hundreds of such cases.
The strategic lead for climate at “Copernicus” Samantha Burgess stated that rising air and ocean temperatures will contribute to the formation of so-called “heat domes”. According to her, this will lead to longer, more intense, and deadly dangerous heat waves.
At the same time, scientists noted that the record-high temperatures last month would have been “virtually impossible” without climate change caused by the burning of fossil fuels.
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