BARCELONA (Reuters) -Spanish authorities are investigating whether a street sweeper’s death over the weekend in Barcelona was caused by an intense heatwave gripping the country and region, the city council said late on Monday.
The woman, who had been cleaning the old town in Barcelona on Saturday afternoon, died later that day at home, her sister told the Antena 3 TV station.
Her sister said the 51-year-old woman, identified just as Montserrat, had told a colleague she thought she “was dying.”
Temperatures reached 30.4 degrees Celsius (86.7 degrees Fahrenheit) in Barcelona on Saturday, weather agency AEMET said.
Extreme heat can kill by causing heat stroke, or aggravating cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, with older people being among the most vulnerable.
The City council said on Monday it would investigate the woman’s death.
Last year, there were 2,032 deaths attributable to heat in Spain, according to the Health Ministry. That number was still lower than heat-linked fatalities in 2023 and 2022.
The first heatwave of the summer hit Spain during the weekend and is set to last until Tuesday.
(Reporting by Joan Faus, Inti Landauro and Emma Pinedo; additional reporting by Ali Withers; Editing by Bernadette Baum)
