Natural disasters caused 30,000 deaths, $220bn losses in 2022.

ISLAMABAD -- An estimated 387 natural hazards and disasters resulted in the death of 30,704 people and caused economic losses of around $223.8 billion all over the world in 2022.

The disasters, recorded by the Emergency Event Database (EM-DAT), affected 185m individuals. The EM-DAT has been maintained by the Brussels-based Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters since 1988.

According to the database, heat waves caused over 16,000 deaths in Europe, while droughts affected 88.9m people in Africa. Hurricane Ian single-handedly caused damage of around $100bn in the Americas.

The human and economic impact of disasters was relatively higher in Africa, with 16.4 per cent of the total deaths taking place in the continent compared to 3.8pc in the previous two decades. In Nigeria, floods caused 603 deaths and resulted in an economic cost of $4.2 bn, while there were 544 flood-related lives lost in South Africa.

More than half of casualties in Europe due to heatwaves

The toll was relatively lower in Asia despite experiencing some of the most destructive disasters in 2022.

The floods in Pakistan from June-September 2022 affected 33m people, causing 1,739 deaths and an economic damage of $15bn. Monsoon floods also struck India (2,035 deaths, $4.2bn losses), Bangladesh (7.2m people affected), and China ($5bn in economic losses).

The February flood in Brazil killed 272 people and the floods in Eastern Australia in February and March resulted in an economic cost of $6.6bn.

The number of catastrophic events in 2022 was slightly higher than average from 2002 to 2021 - 370. The death toll of 30,704 was three times higher than in 2021 but below the 2002-2021 average of 60,955 deaths, the latter being influenced by a few mega-disasters, such as the 2010...