Human Deaths From Extreme Weather Hit Record Low, Even as Climate Disasters Surge

From the wildfires that torched Los Angeles in January to the record-setting heat waves that cooked much of Europe in June, the first half of 2025 has been marked by what now seems like a new normal of ever more frequent extreme weather. It’s easy to feel that we live in a constant stream of weather disasters, with one ending only so another can begin, thanks largely to the amplifying effects of climate change. Yet behind the catastrophic headlines is a much more positive story about the decline in human deaths from extreme weather.

For all of the floods and the fires and the storms and the cyclones, it turns out that globally, fewer people died from the direct effects of extreme weather globally through the first half of 2025 than any six-month period since reliable records began being kept decades ago.