Picture the world 100 or 200 years from now. What are you imagining? Hotter temperatures, melting glaciers or alpine places without snow? With heatwaves happening across Europe this summer, it’s not that hard to visualise.

Now picture Europe in a deep freeze where temperatures hit -20°C in London. Both of these scenarios might be the future we’re heading for, thanks to climate change. And there’s an even more worrying indicator: while almost the entire planet has been warming, there’s one patch in the North Atlantic Ocean just south of Greenland where temperatures have been falling.

Scientists call it the “cold blob”, and some think it could be a warning that one of Earth’s most important climate systems is beginning to change and may soon hit a tipping point where climate change no longer happens gradually. If this system flips, it could have devastating consequences that change all of our lives as we know them.

Winter has traditionally been the most deadly season in the UK. But that is changing, thanks to searing summer heatwaves, with the number of heat-related deaths in England and Wales each year now rivalling deaths from cold weather.

Across England and Wales, just over 40,000 more people died on the hottest days between 1988 and 2025 than would be expected under normal temperatures, new figures released today by the UK’s Office for National Statistics (ONS) show.

By comparison, across the 37-year period, almost 139,000 deaths were associated with the coldest days.

But as summer temperatures rise, the number of heat-related and cold-related deaths each year is starting to converge, the ONS said.

In 1992, hot weather was associated with the deaths of 722 people, compared to 3412 deaths for cold weather. By 2023, hot weather was linked to 2234 deaths in England and Wales, with cold weather during the same year linked to 3294 deaths.

The ONS estimated deaths associated with the coldest 2.5 per cent and hottest 2.5 per cent of days between 1988 and 2025, accounting for other factors such as air pollution.

A series of hot summers, fuelled by a warming climate, has driven the trend in rising heat deaths. All five of the UK’s warmest summers on record have occurred since 2000, with 2022 being the first summer to record a 40°C day in the UK. Deaths associated with hot weather have been rising since 2011.

The ONS data didn’t include 2026 in its assessment, but prolonged high temperatures and successive heatwaves mean England is widely expected to log a record number of heat-related deaths this summer. In July, the UK’s 91ɫ��Ƭ Security Agency (UKHSA) said heatwaves in May and June 2026 had caused 2877 heat-associated deaths in England, almost double the entire 2025 total. That is also higher than the total number of deaths associated with cold weather in England during winter 2024-25, which the UKHSA has at 2544, raising the possibility that heat-related deaths in 2026 could outstrip cold-related deaths for the first time on record.

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Summer heat is “now killing almost as many people as winter cold each year in England and Wales,” said at the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment in London in a statement. “The deaths during the record heat of summer 2026 may be higher than the mortality we experienced last winter.”

 at the University of Surrey says the gap between hot weather deaths and cold weather deaths is “narrowing a lot quicker than anyone anticipated it would”. Without action to help people better cope with high temperatures, we will see “high and rapid growth” in the number of hot weather deaths in the UK over the coming years, he warns.

Climate change is expected to bring even hotter, drier summers to the UK, further increasing the public health risk. Already, more than half of UK homes are at risk of overheating during hot weather – that is projected to rise to 92 per cent by 2050, according to the UK’s Climate Change Committee.

at Warwick University, UK, says factors such as age, chronic disease, social isolation and housing conditions all determine how vulnerable a person is to extreme heat. “Whether deaths from heat will ultimately exceed deaths from cold is still unclear, yet that may not even be the most relevant question,” she says. “The more urgent concern is that heat-related mortality is rising, and many of these deaths could be avoided. How far this pattern persists will depend not just on future warming, but also on how well we adjust our homes, communities, health systems, and cities to a hotter climate.”

When the sun is out, many of us reach for sunscreen, but myths and misinformation have left some people confused about when and how to use it, and how to ensure we still get enough vitamin D. , a skin cancer expert at QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute in Australia, has led clinical trials looking at the link between sun exposure and skin cancer, and sunscreen use and vitamin D. She also recently led the development of a new that considers how to balance the risks and benefits of sun exposure. Here, she lists five things that everyone should know about sunscreen.

Sunscreen should be used as a last line of defence

Many people think it’s OK to lie on the beach all day in a tiny bikini as long as they rub sunscreen all over their exposed skin and reapply it every 2 hours. They think sunscreen makes them bulletproof. But even if you apply the best sunscreen perfectly, it still lets some ultraviolet (UV) radiation through. If you’re out in the sun for hours, that gradually adds up to a dose that is big enough to cause skin damage. At that point, it doesn’t matter if you apply more sunscreen; the damage is already done.

People often assume that if they reapply sunscreen every 2 hours, they’re sort of starting the protection again, but that’s not how it works. You also need to protect yourself with a hat, sunglasses, rash shirt or other protective clothing, and stay in the shade in the middle of the day. Sunscreen should be considered a last line of defence for the parts of your skin that you can’t easily cover while you’re outdoors, like your hands and neck.

There is good evidence that sunscreen protects against skin cancer and wrinkles

The largest, longest-running study of sunscreen was conducted in the Australian town of Nambour. In 1992, 1600 people in the town were randomised to apply daily sunscreen or continue with their normal sunscreen use, which tended to be minimal. It found that those who applied the daily sunscreen were years down the track.

The researchers also created moulds of the backs of the study participants’ hands to look at damage to the surface of the skin. Those in the daily sunscreen group had compared with those who didn’t. When they were followed up on in 2014, they also had .

The sunscreen to choose is the one you like wearing

It’s no good having sunscreen that sits in your cupboard and doesn’t end up on your skin because you don’t like the feel of it. If you’re going on a hike and you’re going to be out all day, it’s better to wear sunscreen with a high sun protection factor (SPF) of 50+. But it’s harder to get a high-SPF sunscreen that feels really nice, so if you’ll be popping out for only short periods throughout the day, you can choose an SPF 15 or 30 sunscreen. Tinted sunscreens can offer the same protection as normal sunscreens, but only if you apply them thickly. But because these often make the skin look overly tinted, people tend to apply them too thinly. One option is to first put on a thick layer of normal sunscreen, then apply the tinted sunscreen on top of it.

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Chemical sunscreens, meaning those that contain organic ingredients such as octocrylene and avobenzone, work by absorbing UV radiation from the sun and converting it to harmless heat. Inorganic sunscreens, also known as mineral or physical sunscreens, contain zinc oxide or titanium dioxide particles. They are often reported to work by reflecting or scattering UV radiation, but they actually , like chemical sunscreens.

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Wearing two layers of sunscreen helps to achieve adequate coverage

You get the SPF listed on the bottle only if you apply 2 milligrams of sunscreen per square centimetre of skin, which is around in an average adult. But it’s really hard to apply this amount of sunscreen in one go. One day, I decided to measure it out exactly, and I couldn’t rub it all on; it was too much. So now, I apply one layer, let it sink in while I brush my teeth and do other things, and then a second layer, so I can apply the full recommended amount.

I was born in Armidale, Australia, in the late 1960s and didn’t wear sunscreen as a child, despite my pale skin. I’ve since had three skin cancers removed, the first of which appeared when I was just 29. So now, I am careful to protect my skin.

If you’re diligent with sunscreen, you might need to take a vitamin D supplement

We recently conducted a trial called the Sun-D Study to see whether applying SPF 50+ sunscreen every day affects people’s vitamin D levels. We randomly assigned 639 people to apply SPF 50+ sunscreen as part of their daily morning routine on days when the UV index was forecast to reach 3 or higher, or to use it at their own discretion. After about a year, a – about 46 per cent compared with 37 per cent in the control group. If you wear sunscreen every day, I would advise taking a vitamin D supplement so that you don’t become deficient, especially in winter. I take one myself – they are cheap, safe and effective.

People with dark-coloured skin are at greater risk of developing a vitamin D deficiency. I recently led the development of a new that looked at how to balance the various risks and benefits of sun exposure. It brought together experts from many Australian universities and medical organisations, and it concluded that people with dark-coloured skin need to put on sunscreen only if they plan to spend more than 2 hours outdoors on days with high UV radiation levels. This is in recognition of the fact that melanoma incidence is 30 times lower in people with dark-coloured skin than in those with light-coloured skin, and that vitamin D deficiency poses a greater risk.

This week’s heatwave is the hottest ever recorded in Europe, as well as the most humid, and it is likely to cause thousands of deaths.

Although a potential “super El Niño” is forming in the Pacific Ocean, this didn’t play a role in the heatwave, a study by the World Weather Attribution network of scientists has found. Instead, global warming is clearly to blame.

The study analysed how likely the average daily maximum temperature projected for 26 to 28 June in western and central Europe would have been in the cooler climates of 1976 and of 2003.

While the weather pattern – a low-pressure heat dome that is trapping hot air from the south – isn’t unusual, the temperatures are. Fifty years ago, a typical June heatwave would have been about 3.5°C cooler, and the temperatures seen over the next three days would have been a less-than-one-in-10,000-year occurrence.

Daytime temperatures have 44°C  (111°F) in one French town, and nighttime temperatures have remained above 30°C (86°F) in parts of Spain.

“This event would not have been possible in June without climate change,” at Imperial College London said at a media briefing on 25 June. “The three-day nighttime temperatures would not have been possible at any time of year without climate change.”

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The humidity has also been unprecedented, reaching more than 50 per cent in many British cities. Dew-point temperatures have been in the low 20s, as compared to the single digits during the July 2022 heatwave that set the UK’s temperature record.

The wet-bulb globe temperature, which measures not just air temperature but also humidity, heat radiation and air movement, has broken or is expected to break records in almost half of European cities, the study found.

Humidity amplifies health risks because it slows evaporation, making sweating less effective. While older people or those who have a chronic illness are in particular danger, so are migrants and people experiencing homelessness.

“What we see very clearly… is how unequal the effects of this heatwave are and how that really demonstrates the inequality that widens due to climate change,” said , also at Imperial College London. “Because it’s of course people who are particularly vulnerable who are most likely to lose their lives.”

While it is too soon to look at excess mortality, a previous study found a smaller heatwave in June and July 2025 killed 2300 people in London and 11 other European cities.

“The health impacts of this heatwave are likely to be extremely high across large parts of northern and central Europe,” said Keeping.

Heatwaves will become even more intense and frequent unless we rapidly cut fossil fuel emissions, the researchers stressed. And Europe, the fastest warming continent, is not ready, as it has an ageing, urban population living in cities built for a cooler era. In the UK, only 5 per cent of homes have air conditioning.

Besides AC, Europe should invest in passive cooling like building insulation, ventilation, green roofs and walls and trees along streets, they said. It should also expand its heat response to include oft-forgotten groups like people with mental health conditions and those who are pregnant, said Carolina Pereira Marghidan at the Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre.

“Europe has heat action plans, but research has also shown that sometimes they do not cover all the groups that may be vulnerable,” she said.

Europe suffered unprecedented wildfires and heatwaves in 2025, impacts that are expected to worsen on the world’s fastest-warming continent.

Last year was the hottest year on record in the UK, Iceland and Norway and one of the three hottest years in Europe as a whole, according to an annual report by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF). More than 95 per cent of the continent experienced above-average annual temperatures. Scandinavia, Finland and north-western Russia saw their worst-ever heatwave, 21 days of simmering temperatures that reached 30°C (86°F) even at the Arctic circle.

This extreme heat probably stunted animal and plant growth while encouraging the spread of invasive species and pests, showing how the climate crisis is contributing to a crash in biodiversity, at the World Meteorological Organization said at a press conference.

“This region would [typically] see zero to two days of strong heat stress, and we are speaking about 21, so this had a major impact on ecosystem health,” she said. “Since 1980, Europe has been warming twice as fast as the global average, [and] heatwaves are becoming more frequent and severe.”

Climate warming set the stage for record wildfires in Portugal and Spain in August, the extremely hot, dry, windy conditions there at least 40 times more likely. More than 10,000 square kilometres burned, and at least three people were killed. Fires approached Madrid, and authorities had to shut down parts of the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage route. Smoke drifted as far as the UK.

Across Europe, wildfires emitted 47 million tonnes of carbon, a record amount. Spain, the UK, the Netherlands, Germany and Cyprus all topped their previous fire-emissions records.

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Soil conditions were the driest in 33 years of observations, with more than a third of Europe suffering extreme agricultural drought, especially the UK, Turkey and Ukraine. While parched soils probably encouraged wildfires in many countries, it was increasing fluctuations in the weather that supercharged the blazes in Portugal and Spain, according to at ECMWF. An extremely wet spring that boosted vegetation growth was followed by record summer heat, which dried out those plants and shrubs, creating a tinderbox.

“If you have a very high fuel load in addition to the wildfire weather, so hot, dry winds in particular, that’s when we get these catastrophic conditions where wildfires spread very quickly,” Burgess said at the briefing. “National parks need… firebreaks around them to make sure if there is a fire, it doesn’t spread.”

The ocean around Europe was also abnormally hot, breaking the record for annual sea surface temperature for the fourth year in a row. A record 86 per cent of these seas suffered strong, severe or extreme marine heatwaves. The most extreme hotspots occurred west of Ireland, south of Iceland and south-east of Spain.

For the past three years, heatwaves have struck 100 per cent of the Mediterranean Sea, which is warming up faster than the global average. Waters in Italy and Spain reached 30°C, warmer than a typical swimming pool, raising the risk of fish death, as well as the spread of bacteria and algae. Past marine heatwaves in the Mediterranean have killed off huge amounts of coral, seagrass beds and shellfish.

To limit future damage, Europe needs to lead the way on slowing climate change, of the European Commission said at the briefing. In 2025, solar power generated a record 12.5 per cent of the continent’s electricity, with a total 46 per cent coming from renewables.

European countries are also among those taking part in the first in Colombia this week, which was organised after the COP30 climate summit in Brazil failed to agree on a roadmap to end oil, gas and coal emissions.

At the same time, Europe should adapt to future climate risks, such as multi-year megadroughts similar to the one already gripping the western US, according to officials.

“We need to address these risks,” Chrenek said. “The cost of inaction is significantly higher than the cost of tackling negative impacts.”