Health ministry expands its highest-level health warning to almost the entire country as scorching temperatures of the Italy heatwave continue to claim lives.

Italy’s health ministry on Tuesday placed almost all of the country’s biggest cities, 25 out of 27, on red alert because of the danger posed by the high temperatures of the deadly heatwave baking Italy and much of Western Europe.

Cagliari, Catania and Trieste on Tuesday joined the 22 cities that were already on red alert: Ancona, Bari, Bologna, Bolzano, Brescia, Campobasso, Civitavecchia, Florence, Frosinone, Genoa, Latina, Milan, Naples, Palermo, Perugia, Pescara, Rieti, Rome, Turin, Venice, Verona and Viterbo.

The only two big cities not on red alert are Messina, on yellow alert, and Reggio Calabria, on orange alert.

The health ministry’s alert system has three levels in addition to level zero, green, meaning there is no alert. Level one, yellow, is pre-alert. Level two, orange, means the temperatures and weather conditions can pose health risks, especially for vulnerable groups such as the elderly and the ill. Red – level three – means the heat poses a risk to the health of the general population, not just vulnerable groups.

Deaths linked to heatwave

A 55-year-old Moroccan farm labourer, Haddad Taher, died on Monday after collapsing while harvesting watermelons in the fields in the Mantua area. His was the latest in a series of deaths linked to the heatwave.

On Monday the local health authority said an 86-year-old man and a 74-year-old woman died at Genoa’s San Martino Polyclinic hospital after being admitted amid scorching temperatures.

A wave of thunderstorms is forecast to arrive in Italy on Tuesday and these are expected to help bring down temperatures, although they could also cause problems of a different nature.