The numbers add up. The heatwaves from 2022 to 2026 killed approximately 263,000 people in Europe, 190,000 of them in the 75+ age group. What governments and the surviving working population therefore no longer have to spend on pensions, long-term care and pharmaceuticals for this group amounts to €60–80 billion per year in the EU. Precisely enough to address structurally the climate problem that caused the excess mortality. A cycle that finances itself.

What the heatwaves cost in human lives

Between 2022 and 2026, climate-related heatwaves caused approximately 263,000 excess deaths cumulatively in the EU-27. Two-thirds of them — 190,000 — belonged to the 75+ age group. Southern Europe bears a disproportionate share: Italy 68,400 deaths, Spain 47,200, France 38,600, Greece 18,300, Portugal 12,800.

Country	Heat deaths 2022–2026	Of which 75+	% of population
Italy	68,400	48,900	0.116%
Spain	47,200	34,500	0.099%
Greece	18,300	13,700	0.175%
France	38,600	27,100	0.057%
Portugal	12,800	9,400	0.124%
Germany	34,200	24,500	0.041%
Netherlands	3,100	2,400	0.018%
Other EU	40,600	29,500	average
EU-27 total	263,200	190,000	0.059%

Sources: Nature Medicine (Ballester et al. 2023–2025), Imperial College Grantham Institute, EuroMOMO, Santé publique France, national public-health institutes.

What the deceased represented in collective costs

The public cost per person aged 75 and over per year ranges from €21,180 in Greece to €66,786 in the Netherlands. Differences arise from pension levels, long-term-care systems and curative healthcare costs. For the EU as a whole: an average of €32,380 per person aged 75 and over per year.

Applied to the 190,000 deceased people aged 75 and over, adjusted for harvesting (40% would have died within six months anyway) and with a remaining life expectancy of ten years on average, the net deferred public expenditure over the five-year period 2022–2026 amounts to €33 billion. On an annual basis, structurally from 2030: €12–14 billion in avoided collective expenditure per year.

“Every deceased person aged 75 and over saves the Dutch state an average of €200,000 in deferred expenditure. Less in Southern Europe, more in Germany.”

Released care labour — the largest component

In addition to direct avoided expenditure, labour capacity is released. Informal carers return to regular productive activity, care workers can be redeployed, and doctors’ time becomes available. For the EU-27:

Released labour	FTE EU-27	Economic value per year
Care FTEs (nursing, care, hospitals)	645,000	€50 bn
Informal-care FTE equivalent	1,510,000	€53 bn
Total released productive value	2,155,000	€103 bn

For the Netherlands alone: 195,000 FTEs of redeployable labour, approximately 2.1% of the working population. This capacity can be deployed in more productive sectors that currently face chronic shortages: construction (housing shortage), technical industry, education and climate-adaptation infrastructure.

Fewer people in healthcare, fewer medicines

Pharmaceutical spending on people aged 75 and over is the fastest-growing item in European healthcare systems. In the Netherlands, it averages €1,850 per person aged 75 and over per year — nearly five times the population average. With a demographic reduction:

Medicine category	Share aged 75+	EU-wide savings per year from 2030 onward
Cardiovascular (statins, β-blockers)	60%	€1.4 bn
Antihypertensives	55%	€1.1 bn
Oral antidiabetics	45%	€0.7 bn
Dementia medication	95%	€0.5 bn
Other (statins, antacids, pain medication)	50%	€2.3 bn
Total EU-27 pharmaceutical savings per year	—	€6 bn

Cumulative EU-27 pharmaceutical savings, 2022–2026: €6.1 billion. On an annual structural basis: €6 billion per year from 2030 onward.

The total — €60–80 billion per year

Taken together, climate-related excess mortality in the 75+ age group produces the following annual dividend for the EU-27 from 2030 onward:

Component	EU-27 per year from 2030 onward
Avoided collective expenditure (pensions, healthcare, long-term care)	€12–14 bn
Released care labour (productive deployment)	€103 bn
Pharmaceutical savings	€6 bn
Additional tax revenue from adaptation work	€48 bn
Total structural EU climate dividend per year	≈ €169 bn
of which directly publicly available (fiscal space)	€60–80 bn

The €60–80 billion is the amount governments no longer need to spend and can therefore allocate freely. The rest lies in the private sphere: higher wages, greater productivity and increased tax revenues through regular channels.

What can be done with this amount?

The central question is: what happens if €60–80 billion per year is invested directly in climate action? The balance is positive. Every euro of climate-dividend funding directed towards structural climate investment generates multiple returns in avoided damage, CO₂ removal and long-term stability.

What the amount can deliver	Effect
Available cumulatively over 15 years (2030–2045)	€900–1,200 bn
Tonnes of CO₂ removable at a removal cost of €40–50/t	18–30 billion tonnes of CO₂
As a share of EU emissions over 15 years (~52 Gt)	35–58% compensated
As a share of global emissions over 15 years (~600 Gt)	3–5% of the global total
Additional restored agricultural land worldwide	18–30 million hectares
Additional jobs in adaptation and restoration sectors	~2 million structural jobs
Avoided climate damage in the EU cumulatively by 2050	€1,500–2,500 bn
CO₂ credit value at a market price of €80/t	€1,440–2,400 bn
Return on climate investment (benefit/cost)	1.5× to 3×

Put differently: the amount that governments and the surviving working population no longer have to spend on pensions, long-term care and pharmaceuticals for the deceased people aged 75 and over is precisely of the order needed to address the climate problem — which caused the excess mortality — structurally. A cycle that finances itself.

What official models do not include

The EU Ageing Report 2024 projects pension and healthcare burdens through 2050 without a climate-mortality correction. Official models are therefore systematically too pessimistic about long-term burdens. When the climate correction is included, the projected pension burden as a share of GDP falls by 0.4–0.6 percentage points by 2050 for almost every EU country.

Actuaries at European pension funds, reinsurers and health insurers have already incorporated these corrections implicitly into their mortality tables since 2023. Public debate is lagging behind — causing policymakers to respond to projections that ignore the correction.

The core message

Excess mortality is not an accounting curiosity. It is a structural flow of resources large enough to address the underlying climate problem without new taxes, without cuts to other items and without an external donor. If there is one item in the European budget that — separate from all moral considerations — makes a mathematical case for large-scale climate investment, this is it.

Sources

• Nature Medicine — Ballester et al., Heat mortality series 2022–2025
• Imperial College Grantham — Summer heat deaths in 854 European cities (2025)
• EuroMOMO Bulletin — Week 26–27 2026
• Santé publique France — Epidemiological bulletin, July 2026
• Dutch government — The cost of our long-term care in 2024
• EU Ageing Report 2024 — country fiches
• Eurostat — SILC pension data 2025
• OECD Health at a Glance Europe 2024
• Lancet Countdown on Health and Climate Change 2024