The development of heat stress watch warning systems for five European cities: results from the European Union PHEWE project

The general aim of the EU PHEWE project is to assess the association between weather and acute health effects (daily mortality and hospital admissions) during the warm season in Europe and to provide information for public health policy on preventive and adaptive actions. One such adaptive action is the development of Heat Stress Watch Warning Systems (HSWWS) for the prediction and warning of heat related mortality. This paper will describe the climate science issues associated with the development of experimental HSWWS for London, Paris, Barcelona, Rome and Budapest and touch on some of the barriers associated with the implementation of HSWWS related intervention strategies. Results from the PHEWE project show that no one single climate-based system for the prediction of heat related mortality can be applied universally across the five experimental cities. Furthermore, because of contrasting socio-political structures, the nature of the HSWWS related intervention strategies varies between the five PHEWE cities.