France Heat Wave Death Toll at 15,000

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Wednesday, September 10, 2003

France Heat Wave Death Toll at 15,000

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France's leading undertaker estimated the country's death toll from the summer heat wave at 15,000 on Tuesday, far exceeding the official tally and putting further pressure on the government to improve its health care system.

The estimate by the General Funeral Services included deaths from the second half of August, after the record-breaking temperatures of the first half of the month had abated, said company spokeswoman Isabelle Dubois-Costes.

The bulk of the victims many of them elderly died during the height of the heat wave, which brought suffocating temperatures of up to 104 degrees in a country where air conditioning is rare. Others apparently were greatly weakened during the peak temperatures but did not die until days later.

The government at the end of August announced a preliminary death toll of 11,435, but that figure was based only on deaths in the first two weeks of the month.

The Health Surveillance Institute, which calculates the official toll for the government, would not comment on the undertaker estimate and said it would release updated figures for August at the end of September.

The new estimate came after the government on Monday released a harshly worded report blaming the deaths on hospital understaffing during summer holidays, widespread failure among agencies and health services to coordinate efforts, and chronically insufficient care for the elderly.

The report called on authorities to take bold steps, including the establishment of a health alert system to prevent a similar disaster. It was still unclear how the government planned to deal with the heat wave's fallout.

While the government has been widely criticized for a slow response to the crisis, President Jacques Chirac's center-right government has suffered minimal political damage thanks in large part to the disarray and lagging popularity of the opposition since Socialist Prime Minister Lionel Jospin fell from power last year.

Source: Agencies

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