00:00For more, we can bring in Carlo Buontempo, Director of the Covert-Engineers Climate Change
00:04Service. Thank you so much for coming on Europe today. Just tell us, how unusual is this heat
00:09for late June? And can we expect this heat to continue into July?
00:13Well, I mean, what you were describing is the answer to your question, in a sense, because
00:18the conditions are extremely unusual. We see temperature 10, 12 degrees above the normal
00:25averages for France, for part of the UK. We've seen recent days. And as you said, now that
00:32the peak of the heat wave is moving east, we are seeing record-breaking temperature affecting
00:36eastern Germany, affecting Czechia and Poland. So this is very unusual. And at the moment,
00:42it doesn't necessarily look as the end is near. The peak, maybe in Western Europe, has been
00:48reached. But looking at the forecast, and for the forecast, the national med services are
00:53the best place to look at, there is not a clear sign for rain coming in or a reduction,
01:01a massive reduction in temperature.
01:02And based on your expertise, is it climate change making these extreme heat events more
01:06frequent and more intense?
01:08Well, you know, as always, it's a combination. These events, high-pressure regions extending
01:12over Europe, have existed throughout history. We have seen many heat waves before this one,
01:17starting from the famous or infamous 2003 heat wave. But this same weather pattern are
01:24now operating in a world that is much, much warmer. And Europe is warming faster than the
01:28global average. And we see this heat wave becoming more frequent, more intense, lasting longer
01:33and starting earlier in the season.
01:35And what are the biggest health risks, especially for vulnerable people? We've already seen the
01:39deaths that have been announced from this.
01:40Yeah. And there is actually a paper that came out last week from a colleague of ours at the
01:47ECNWF, Rebecca Emerton, that was published in Nature. And she looked at the heat stress. And heat
01:53stress has gone up all over the globe, not just in Europe. And heat stress is a cause of death
01:58for
01:59many humans. And actually, the heat-related mortality in Europe, as the Lancet countdown pointed out a
02:06couple of years ago, has gone up 30% in the last 20 years. So having more heat waves means
02:11that
02:11actually our own risk of facing the consequences of heat stress has gone up very significantly and
02:18will continue to go up, unfortunately, as the temperature rises, not just in Europe, but across
02:23the world.
02:24Okay, Carlo, buon tempo. Thank you so much for your analysis, as always, and for joining us here
02:29on the programme.
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