It was only two weeks ago that I wrote about the official cover up of excess deaths in winter. It did not take long for my suspicions to be confirmed.
Last week the Telegraph reported:
Three times more people die during cold snaps than when the weather is very hot, official data show.
Figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show that from 1988 to 2025, about 42,000 people died on the hottest days. On the coldest days almost 150,000 died, in the same period.
However, data suggest the difference between the numbers of deaths because of cold and heat is shrinking.
The average annual death toll from cold in the 1990s was four times that of heat. But in the years 2015-2025, the difference shrank to 1.5-fold.
This trend is being driven by more frequent and persistent periods of very hot weather, which have resulted in heat-related deaths peaking in the summer of 2022, when temperatures in the UK reached 40°C for the first time on record.
There were an estimated 4,652 heat-related deaths in England and Wales in 2022, the highest figure for any year on record.
Three of the five highest years were in the past 10: 2025 (2,805 deaths) and 2018 (2,617), along with 2022.
All figures are based on modelled estimates of mortality and are not actual counts of deaths directly caused by extreme weather.
Commenting on the findings, James Tucker of the
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I remain surprised that there is anyone alive in southern Spain and Portugal. They must be made of tougher stuff.
‘Que calor!’, they often mutter, before not dying on the spot. Many even insist on surviving into late-stage old-agedness.
What about all the people from Northern Europe who go and live in those countries and spend billions annually on holidays there? It’s a miracle there is anyone left alive.
“This trend is being driven by more frequent and persistent periods of very hot weather…”
Actually it correlates with Labour getting in again and many people, particularly the old who remember the 1970s, have lost the will to live.
Ha ha. Excellent
“… by more frequent and persistent periods of very hot weather…”
More frequent compared to what and how much more frequent? Random events often cluster but overall even out.
I haven’t noticed more frequent very hot weather. I have noticed more frequent alerts claiming “hottest evah!” And more alerts: eg Amber Alert for rain – whatever that means, as if rain is uncommon on this island, and Amber Alert for thunderstorms, which don’t happen but are usual in Summer with warm temperatures.
I await Amber Alert for Normal Weather.
The proportion of the population that is aged is greater today than the 1990s – so we have more elderly people in their 80s and 90s more susceptible to temperature and other factors.
We have a funeral director next door where I work. This summer has been very slow for them, compared to previous. And apparently they are not alone. I asked the lady that owns the business why the bodies aren’t piled up out the back, as per the government figures. I had to go and sit down when she suggested that maybe the statistics and reality are two different things.
Ah. No. Well. You see it’s the cost of living… well, for those not dying. They can’t afford a proper funeral.
Over the last twenty years ONS death statistics point to three main conclusions:
i) There is a consistent seasonal difference in death rates.
ii) Life expectancy is increasing.
iii) The medical interventions introduced to firstly advertise and promote (by bumping off patients in April-May 2020 with Morphine and Midazolam) and secondly to exploit (by injecting people with experimental gene therapy) the Wuhan laboratory experiment tested (but not to destruction) conclusion i) and conclusion ii).
I realise one statement is looking at cold days and the other at cold seasons. However, 42,000 x 1.5 = 63,000 not 150,000. ‘The average annual death toll from cold’ requires some sort of diagnosis of cause of death whereas a simple count of deaths on the hottest and coldest days does not.
In the UK and probably elsewhere, life expectancy (a model/forecast) and most common age at death (a measure) has increased rapidly since 1900. Probably mostly due to sanitation and heating. If the ratio between numbers of deaths during cold and hot seasons has reduced it is more likely due to keeping people warmer during the cold than them suffering from the heat.
Might it be that Global Boiling (TM) is reducing the toll from cold weather?
“Heat deaths” – a lot like “covid deaths”
Do we need the ONS? My inclination right now is that the state has no business taking our money to produce statistics.
Especially made-up statistics.
I worry that it will always end up like this- the state will just expand forever if left unchecked, and will chip away at freedom in order to do so
There is something very odd about the ONS not supplying statistics that they should have but offering estimates instead. It is as if they don’t want to tell us the truth.
Trying to keep cool during hot weather is a lot easier than trying to remain warm during cold weather. In the latter I have to be in a non drafty building with artificial heating. However, we have, or rather our illustrious leaders have exorted us all to have heat retaining houses. During all the recent hot weather the outside temperature is fairly pleasant while the inside and upstairs temperature is quite warm. In my loft the temperature is hot. I used to have a storage heater in a London flat which consisted of bricks that were heated up and then released the heat over the day. A lot of houses are brick while the roofs are either dark slate or clay tiles, both of which absorb heat.
Before I was born the family had a dog that would sit in front of the fire. When it got too hot it would bark at the fire.
“When it got too hot it would bark at the fire.”
Perfect description of an Environmentalist.
Lies, damned lies and the Office for National Statistics.
Ever wonder why anything that comes out of (any) government’s mouth is taken with an ever larger pinch of salt
Funny how timing is being politicised but when there was a prolonged period of excess deaths over a long period, that was not commented on by the ONS in relation to possible cause
Not believed anything they’ve come out with since they chose to stop publishing covid deaths (vaxed vs non-vaxed) once the former began to exceed the latter.
‘All the statistics that are fit to be announced, so long as they tell the story we want.’