New heat death figures should be wake-up call on excess heat in homes, says CIEH

The Chartered Institute of Environmental Health (CIEH) says new heat death figures from the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) should be a wake-up call on the need to tackle excess heat in homes.

A UKHSA interim heat mortality monitoring report indicates there were an estimated 2,877 heat-associated deaths during two notable periods of hot weather in England in May and June 2026, almost double the figure reported annually for 2025.

Hot weather poses particularly significant health risks for older people and people with underlying medical conditions. It also increases the pressures on the NHS.

CIEH argues that, as heatwaves become more frequent due to global warming, environmental health practitioners (EHPs) have a crucial role to play in tackling the housing problems that contribute to heat-associated deaths.

Many EHPs work for local authority teams enforcing housing legislation. CIEH says their expertise makes them particularly well placed to identify homes where the risk of harm due to excess heat is high and to ensure that measures are taken to reduce this risk.

CIEH is urging the Government to ensure that funding for local authority housing enforcement is sustained and predictable and permits local authorities to attract new staff and fund their training.

Further information about the UKHSA figures can be found here.

Dr Henry Dawson, a member of the housing advisory panel of the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health, said:

“Environmental health practitioners are one of the few professional groups bringing about the changes to our existing housing stock that are needed to combat the effects of more frequent extreme weather events.

“The resilience of existing homes to these events is an issue that affects the lives of millions of people. We need to drive it up the political agenda.”