Marked by periods of high heat, the summer of 2022 experienced the highest excess summer mortality in the past 20 years, the public health institute Sciensano said on Wednesday. The Covid-19 also continued to claim victims. The warning phase of the high heat and ozone peaks plan – put in place after the 2003 heat wave which claimed the lives of 45,000 people in Europe – was activated four times this summer (from June 15 to 18, from June 14 to July 20, from August 6 to 17 and from August 22 to 26), compared to only one in 2021 and two in 2020.
A heat wave was also observed during the third phase, i.e. maximum temperatures above 25 degrees for five consecutive days with at least three days above 30 degrees.
The summer as a whole was marked by an excess mortality of 2,291 deaths (out of a total of 42,383), i.e. 5.7% more than the predictions of the Belgian Mortality Monitoring, compared to 3.5% in 2021 and 4.3 % in 2020. This is the highest summer excess mortality for the last 20 years and a result close to that of the two extreme weeks of August 2003. During the last three warning phases, the excess mortality exceeded the 14%. In addition to the heat, the Covid-19 also participated in this significant excess mortality with 1,098 deaths during the summer.
Sciensano also noted a particularly high excess mortality among women from the age of 85 (14.1%). Conversely, only 350 additional deaths were recorded among men this summer.