An application developed by the Higher Scientific Research Council (CSIC) will monitor deaths that occur in Spain and that can be attributed to high temperatures. A tool that will help specify the impact of heat on human health.
The system, developed by the scientific team of the Institute of Environmental Diagnosis and Water Studies (IDAEA-CSIC), the University of Valencia (UV) and the Foundation for Climate Research (FIC), uses official data from the Monitoring system of Daily Mortality (MOMO) and temperatures recorded by the State Meteorological Agency (Aemet) to calculate mortality attributable to heat.
"The Aemet and the Ministry of Health give notice of the arrival of a heat wave, but do not report the potential impact on health or even the impact of isolated days of extreme heat," explains the FIC researcher and author of the work, Dominic Royé.
As explained by the CSIC in a press release, this application, called Mortality Attributable to Heat in Spain (MACE) and available through any browser, is capable of distinguishing between moderate, extreme and excessive heat from the months of June to August in Spain.
"The extreme heat threshold is established by the 95th percentile, which indicates that only 5% of the days have temperatures equal to or higher between June and September of the last 10 years," continues Royé.
MACE is updated daily and provides temperature-related mortality data for the past five years. Of that period, the year 2022 is the most significant with a record of 3,012 deaths due to heat during the 28 days that there was extreme heat in summer. The summer period of 2023 was the third with the highest mortality attributable to excessive heat (2,155 deaths).
However, the authors acknowledge some limitations. This technology calculates mortality only during the summer and at the national level, without considering geographical differences or vulnerable population groups by age or gender. For this reason, they are already working to incorporate these variables, as well as to expand data collection from May to October.
