Cold weather ‘kills far more than hot weather worldwide’

A new international study has called current public health policy into question by revealing that cold weather causes far more deaths than hot weather worldwide.

Led by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, the study analysed just over 74 million deaths between 1985 and 2012 in 13 countries, spanning a wide range of climate conditions.

According to data published in The Lancet, around 7.71 percent of all deaths were caused by non-optimal temperatures, with 7.29 percent of the total being attributed to the cold, compared to just 0.42 percent caused by heat.

Moreover, although it was previously assumed that extreme weather causes the majority of temperature-related deaths, the majority actually happened on moderately hot and cold days, with most caused by moderately cold temperatures.

Dr Antonio Gasparrini from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine in the UK said: "Current public health policies focus almost exclusively on minimising the health consequences of heat waves. Our findings suggest that these measures need to be refocused and extended."