The summer of 2022 has been particularly deadly. The summer period was indeed marked by an excess of more than 10,000 deaths in France, partly linked to high temperatures, but also to Covid-19, according to an estimate published Monday evening by the health authorities. This figure is in line with a previous, provisional estimate from INSEE: more than 11,000 additional deaths from June 1 to August 22 compared to the same period in 2019, therefore before the start of the pandemic.
The calculation of Public Health France (SpF) is based on the number of deaths observed compared to that expected. That is to say compared to the five previous summers, with a greater weight in recent years to adjust in particular with the aging population.
Heat wave and Covid-19 do not mix
During the second hottest summer since 1900, there were 10,420 excess deaths (+6.1%) between June 1 and September 15. Some of these deaths are concentrated in the three heat wave episodes: 2,816 recorded over these periods alone. This is the “largest toll since 2003”, the year of the deadliest heat wave (15,000 dead), noted Public Health France in a bulletin Heat wave and health.
Part of the excess mortality is “probably due to exposure to high heat”, below “heat wave alert thresholds”. We will have to wait until early 2023 to have an estimate of its magnitude. The Covid-19, rebounding this summer, also comes into play. But “there is an interaction between these two inseparable phenomena”, summarizes Guillaume Boulanger, head of the “Quality of living and working environments and population health” unit at SpF.
People aged 75 and over were the most affected during the three heat waves: one in six excess deaths affected them (2,272 excess deaths, +20.2%). During these periods, 894 deaths linked to Covid-19 were also recorded, mainly for French people aged 70 and over.