Excess mortality attributable to the 2025 Iberian Peninsula blackout
File(s)
Published version
Author(s)
Konstantinoudis, Garyfallos
Riou, Julien
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
On 28 April 2025, a widespread power outage affected mainland Portugal and Spain for around ten hours, causing major disruptions and eight reported deaths. Health impacts of blackouts range from direct effects, such as medical equipment failure, to indirect effects such as disrupted healthcare. Here we show that the 2025 Iberian blackout is associated with increased mortality in Spain, but not in Portugal. We find little evidence of excess mortality on the day of the event itself. In Spain, however, mortality rises over the next two days (+167 deaths; 95% credible interval: +28 to +300; +2.4% relative increase), particularly among women aged 85+. We also observe regional differences, but their drivers remain uncertain and may include variation in outage severity, underlying vulnerabilities, or local health-system and infrastructure conditions. These findings highlight the underestimated health burden of blackouts and the need for improved preparedness in a changing climate.
Date Issued
2026-08-21
Date Acceptance
2026-07-03
Citation
Nature Communications, 2026, 17
ISSN
2041-1723
Publisher
Nature Portfolio
Journal / Book Title
Nature Communications
Volume
17
Copyright Statement
© The Author(s) 2026. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
License URL
Identifier
10.1038/s41467-026-75581-w
Publication Status
Published
Article Number
ARTN 8805
Date Publish Online
2026-07-20