{"id":461231,"date":"2026-07-28T12:20:59","date_gmt":"2026-07-28T10:20:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/2026\/07\/28\/belgio-euromomo-a-giugno-il-tasso-di-mortalita-in-eccesso-piu-alto-deuropa\/"},"modified":"2026-07-28T12:53:54","modified_gmt":"2026-07-28T10:53:54","slug":"euromomo-belgium-had-europes-highest-excess-mortality-rate-in-june","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/2026\/07\/28\/euromomo-belgium-had-europes-highest-excess-mortality-rate-in-june\/","title":{"rendered":"EuroMOMO: Belgium had Europe\u2019s highest excess mortality rate in June"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brussels \u2013 In June, Belgium recorded the highest excess mortality rate in Europe during heatwaves, according to  Belgian newspaper Het Nieuwsblad, which based its findings on data from the European surveillance network that monitors weekly mortality rates, EuroMOMO<\/a><\/strong>. With an excess mortality rate of 48 per cent, the country is said to have surpassed France (23 per cent) and the Netherlands (13 per cent). <\/p>\n

According to the Belgian Federal Institute for Public Health, Animal Health and Food Safety (Sciensano)<\/a>, during the heatwave that lasted from 18 June to 1 July, Belgium recorded <\/strong>1,747 <\/strong><\/a>more deaths than expected<\/strong>, representing an excess mortality rate of 47.8 per cent. Wallonia was the hardest-hit region, with an excess mortality rate of 76 per cent. The data also show that the heatwave did not affect only older people: an excess mortality rate of 61.3 per cent was observed among people aged between 15 and 64. These findings come from Be-MOMO<\/a>, Sciensano\u2019s mortality monitoring system. The deadliest day was 27 June, with 641 deaths and an excess mortality rate of 146.5 per cent.<\/p>\n

 In Wallonia, mortality rates are significantly higher than in other regions. During the canicule<\/em> in June \u2013 a French term for a heatwave \u2013 an excess mortality rate of 76 per cent was recorded \u2013 919 more deaths than expected; in Flanders, the figure was 31.4 per cent \u2013 with 682 additional deaths \u2013 while in Brussels it was 60.9 per cent \u2013 with 159 more deaths.<\/p>\n

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To date, Be-MOMO does not allow for the identification of a cause of death or an explanation for these significant regional differences, and states that \u201ca more in-depth analysis will be required.\u201d It does, however, note that the heatwave is among the possible causes, given the combination of the three main factors affecting health: the duration of the event, the intensity of the temperatures, and ozone concentrations. 
Geert Molenberghs<\/strong>, a professor at the Faculty of Medicine at the Universities of Leuven and Hasselt, also pointed out that the heat has hardest hit people living in the poorest regions. During an interview with the Flemish media, he stated that \u201cthere is, for example, a significant difference between Flanders and Wallonia, so there is an undeniable socio-economic aspect to all this.\u201d Therefore, \u201cit is cooler in a large, detached house with some green space around it than in a small flat with too many people.\u201d Given that Flanders was more severely affected (31 per cent) than France and the Netherlands, \u201cwe need to rethink the way we build,\u201d he added. According to Molenberghs, the statistics themselves also play an important role. \u201cNorthern France was affected just as much as we were,\u201d he said, while \u201cin the south, and particularly in the south-east of France, there was no significant increase in deaths compared with the average.\u201d This means that \u201cthese regions are better adapted to high temperatures,\u201d he concluded.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Brussels \u2013 In June, Belgium recorded the highest excess mortality rate in Europe during heatwaves, according to  Belgian newspaper Het Nieuwsblad, which based its findings on data from the European surveillance network that monitors weekly mortality rates, EuroMOMO. With an excess mortality rate of 48 per cent, the country is said to have surpassed France […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7908,"featured_media":461211,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"format":"standard","override":[{"template":"1","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_category":"1","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"1","show_popup_post":"1","show_comment_section":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"0","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"0"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0","subtitle":""},"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[25712,25774],"tags":[26261,25801,31280,34768,35079,29736,33008,35080,26527,28807],"class_list":["post-461231","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general-news","category-in-brief","tag-belgian-cat-en","tag-bruxelles-en-3","tag-fiandre","tag-hasselt","tag-broth-en","tag-lovanio","tag-morti-in-eccesso","tag-paesi-bassi-en","tag-vallonia-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461231","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7908"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=461231"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461231\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":461232,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461231\/revisions\/461232"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/461211"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=461231"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=461231"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=461231"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}