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The Independent UK
The Independent UK
National
John Leicester

Deaths surged 29% in France during week of record heat, health agency says

France Heat Wave Hot Hospitals - (Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.)

Deaths surged by nearly a third in France during the hottest week of a record heat wave last month, the country’s public health authority said Friday, reporting at least 2,000 more deaths than in the previous week when temperatures were already climbing and filling emergency wards with heat victims.

The new and still incomplete figures from Public Health France doubled its first preliminary estimate of at least 1,000 additional deaths that it gave last Sunday. That earlier estimate covered just three of the hottest days of extreme, deadly heat.

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