Graphic detail | Out in the cold

Expensive energy may have killed more Europeans than covid-19 last winter

Our modelling estimates that high energy prices claimed 68,000 lives

After russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Vladimir Putin weaponised his country’s energy supplies: cutting gas exports to Europe and causing prices to surge. Although wholesale costs have now fallen across the continent, the prices of domestic electricity and gas, compared with two years earlier, were up by an eye-watering 69% and 145% last winter.

This article appeared in the Graphic detail section of the print edition under the headline “Out in the cold”

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