Global excess deaths associated with heatwaves in 2023 and the contribution of human-induced climate change

An unprecedented heatwave swept the globe in 2023, marking it one of the hottest years on record and raising concerns about its health impacts. However, a comprehensive assessment of the heatwave-related mortality and its attribution to human-induced climate change remains lacking. We aim to address this gap by analyzing high-resolution climate and mortality data from 2,013 locations across 67 countries/territories using a three-stage modeling approach. First, we estimated historical heatwave-mortality associations using a quasi-Poisson regression model with distributed lag structures, considering lag effects, seasonality, and within-week variations. Second, we pooled the estimates in meta-regression, accounting for spatial heterogeneity and potential changes in heatwave-mortality associations over time. Third, we predicted grid-specific (0.5 0.5) association in 2023 and calculated the heatwave-related excess deaths, death ratio, and death rate per million people. Attribution analysis was conducted by comparing heatwave-related mortality under factual and counterfactual climate scenarios. We estimated 178,486 excess deaths (95% empirical confidence interval [eCI], 159,892≥204,147) related to the 2023 heatwave, accounting for 0.73% of global deaths, corresponding to 23 deaths per million people. The highest mortality rates occurred in Southern (120, 95% eCI, 116≥126), Eastern (107, 95% eCI, 100≥114), and Western Europe (66, 95% eCI, 62≥70), where the excess death ratio was also higher. Notably, 54.29% (95% eCI, 45.71%≥61.36%) of the global heatwave-related deaths were attributable to human-induced climate change. These results underscore the urgent need for adaptive public health interventions and climate mitigation strategies to reduce future mortality burdens in the context of increasing global warming.

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Publication Details

Journal
The Innovation
Published
2025-09-04
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.xinn.2025.101110
Citations
3
Primary Topic
Climate Change and Health Impacts
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
3.60
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article

Global excess deaths associated with heatwaves in 2023 and the contribution of human-induced climate change

Aleš Urban, Jan Kyselý, Malcolm Mistry, Michelle Lee Bell et al.
3 citations
The Innovation
Climate Change and Health Impacts
3.60
article

Global excess deaths associated with heatwaves in 2023 and the contribution of human-induced climate change

Aleš Urban, Jan Kyselý, Malcolm Mistry, Michelle Lee Bell, Simon Hales, Antonio Gasparrini, Samuel Hundessa, Aurelio Tobı́as, Souzana Achilleos, Francesca Katherine de'Donato, Rongbin Xu, Jochem O. Klompmaker, Francesco Sera, Shilu Tong, Micheline de Sousa Zanotti Stagliorio Coêlho, Wenzhong Huang, Zhengyu Yang, Dominic Royé, Carmen Íñiguez, Ben Armstrong, Shanshan Li, Yuming Guo, Qi Zhao, Veronika Huber
article en
3 citations

Abstract

An unprecedented heatwave swept the globe in 2023, marking it one of the hottest years on record and raising concerns about its health impacts. However, a comprehensive assessment of the heatwave-related mortality and its attribution to human-induced climate change remains lacking. We aim to address this gap by analyzing high-resolution climate and mortality data from 2,013 locations across 67 countries/territories using a three-stage modeling approach. First, we estimated historical heatwave-mortality associations using a quasi-Poisson regression model with distributed lag structures, considering lag effects, seasonality, and within-week variations. Second, we pooled the estimates in meta-regression, accounting for spatial heterogeneity and potential changes in heatwave-mortality associations over time. Third, we predicted grid-specific (0.5 0.5) association in 2023 and calculated the heatwave-related excess deaths, death ratio, and death rate per million people. Attribution analysis was conducted by comparing heatwave-related mortality under factual and counterfactual climate scenarios. We estimated 178,486 excess deaths (95% empirical confidence interval [eCI], 159,892≥204,147) related to the 2023 heatwave, accounting for 0.73% of global deaths, corresponding to 23 deaths per million people. The highest mortality rates occurred in Southern (120, 95% eCI, 116≥126), Eastern (107, 95% eCI, 100≥114), and Western Europe (66, 95% eCI, 62≥70), where the excess death ratio was also higher. Notably, 54.29% (95% eCI, 45.71%≥61.36%) of the global heatwave-related deaths were attributable to human-induced climate change. These results underscore the urgent need for adaptive public health interventions and climate mitigation strategies to reduce future mortality burdens in the context of increasing global warming.

The InnovationVol. 6(10)
Ca' Foscari University of Venice (IT), Shandong University (CN), Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute (CH), Universitat de València (ES), Queensland University of Technology (AU), University of Nicosia (CY), Universidade de São Paulo (BR), Chinese Center For Disease Control and Prevention (CN), University of Basel (CH), Czech University of Life Sciences Prague (CZ), Helmholtz Zentrum München (DE), Yale University (US), Estación Biológica de Doñana (ES), London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (GB), Misión Biológica de Galicia (ES), National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (NL), National Research Council (LK), Institute of Environmental Assessment and Water Research (ES), Czech Academy of Sciences, Institute of Atmospheric Physics (CZ), Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Epidemiología y Salud Pública (ES), Nagasaki University (JP), University of Florence (IT), Monash University (AU), University of Otago (NZ)
Openalex Percentile: Top 7%
Climate Change and Health Impacts
3.60
DOIOpen Access PDFOpenAlex
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