(de-news.net) – A Verdi survey found that extreme heat is exposing German care-home staff and residents to unsafe indoor temperatures, while staffing shortages may intensify the risks. Medical experts also warn that Germany’s official count of heat-related deaths may underestimate the true toll and are calling for stronger national heat protections.
This summer, a large number of residents and nursing staff at German care homes are being exposed to temperatures that violate workplace safety regulations and could pose a serious threat to health. The conclusion comes from a study conducted by the Verdi trade union among 321 nurses and other employees of care facilities, as reported by publications of the Funke media group. Between July 30 and August 10, participants regularly recorded indoor temperatures, producing a total of 801 readings. The measurements show that extreme heat was not confined to the hottest part of the day: median temperatures reached 26°C overnight, 25°C in the early morning and between 28°C and 30°C during the day, while peak midday readings climbed as high as 45°C.
Under Germany’s occupational safety standards, rooms reaching 35°C or higher are generally considered unsuitable as workplaces, while effective measures are required once indoor temperatures exceed 30°C. The figures reported by Verdi indicate that such thresholds were frequently reached. Among participating employees, 12.8 percent recorded at least one temperature above 35°C, while 40.9 percent reported at least one reading above 30°C. On a 10-point scale measuring the burden imposed by heat, employees gave an average rating of 8.2, with a median of 9, underscoring the extent to which the conditions were experienced as stressful. Employees also reported serious consequences among residents: 11 percent said residents had experienced circulatory collapse, 10 percent reported cases of dehydration and 9 percent reported deaths that appeared to be connected to heat.
Sylvia Bühler, a member of Verdi’s national executive board, described the conditions documented by employees as deeply concerning. Temperatures reaching 45°C, she said, could be intolerable for employees and potentially life-threatening for residents. She called for an immediate federal and state initiative to strengthen heat protection and finance energy-efficient upgrades at care facilities. Adequate public investment, she argued, could also help reduce the frequently substantial out-of-pocket costs borne by residents.
The heat is also placing additional pressure on a care system already facing staffing shortages. Bühler said those shortages, which are difficult enough under normal circumstances, become particularly severe during periods of extreme heat. Sick leave can increase at the same time that staff members are expected to introduce additional measures to protect residents, creating a demand for more personnel precisely when fewer workers may be available. She also criticized the continuing practice of having individual nurses cover entire shifts, particularly overnight, with a single trained worker sometimes responsible for 100 or more residents.
Bühler argued that staffing arrangements of this kind are fundamentally incompatible with professional nursing care and illustrate the need to reconsider the federal government’s plans for long-term care insurance. Rather than pursuing reductions in spending, she said, staffing requirements should reflect actual care needs and should be fully reimbursed. The issue, in that view, is not simply one of working conditions but also of whether care facilities have sufficient capacity to respond to extraordinary environmental stresses.
Heat-related mortality may be underestimated
The number of heat-related deaths in Germany may be significantly higher than official estimates suggest, according to Uwe Janssens, medical head of the German Interdisciplinary Association for Intensive and Emergency Medicine, or DIVI. Janssens considers the Robert Koch Institute’s estimate of 12,500 heat-related deaths this summer too low, arguing that conventional mortality statistics do not fully capture the effects of extreme heat. He said the estimate may fail to account for several thousand additional deaths in which heat played a role.
The difficulty, he said, is partly that extreme heat can contribute indirectly to deaths that are formally attributed to other medical causes. Older adults in particular may have a reduced sense of thirst, making them less likely to recognize fluid loss and compensate for dehydration. As dehydration progresses, changes in the concentration of electrolytes in the body can contribute to severe complications, including kidney failure and death. In an older person with preexisting heart or kidney disease, heat may therefore be a substantial contributing factor even when a death certificate records organ failure as the immediate cause. Such cases are difficult for standard mortality statistics to identify because the role of heat may not be explicitly recorded.
Janssens has consequently called on federal and state authorities to strengthen protections for vulnerable groups, including older people and those with chronic medical conditions. He supports a legally binding national heat-protection plan, greater coordination between different levels of government and substantial investment in climate control for health care facilities. Many emergency rooms still lack air conditioning, while equipping a single room can cost between 15,000 and 20,000 euros. Bringing entire buildings up to the necessary standard can therefore represent an expense that individual hospitals are unable to absorb on their own.
The response, Janssens argued, should extend beyond physical infrastructure. Community-based measures, including neighborhood assistance, psychosocial support and local networks, could help identify vulnerable people and provide protection before heat exposure becomes life-threatening. France offers one possible model, he said, because local governments there actively contact people considered vulnerable during periods of extreme heat.
The comparison highlights a broader concern about how heat-related risk is addressed outside hospitals and care facilities. In Germany, Janssens argued, some deaths that occur during periods of extreme heat may reflect not only the physiological effects of high temperatures but also gaps in the systems intended to identify and protect people at risk. In that sense, he said, preventable deaths can be linked both to environmental exposure and to shortcomings in social protection.
