The death toll from this summer's heat in Europe is up to 19,000. Dead.
Meanwhile, Instapundit cites this "eminent British historian and author" for the proposition that the French are learning the hard lessons of their hedonism.
France received a shock this summer, when more than 10,000 of its elderly citizens died in distress during a heat wave--some while supposedly under medical care in hospitals. Thanks to the 35-hour workweek and the long August holiday, these institutions were short-staffed. The families of those who died were on holiday, too.
(Somewhere cooler I presume.)
Watch out, says Mr. Johnson, the Frenchie hedonism disease is catching, and all of Europe is coming down with it. Next thing you know, the Germans will be partying on Baltic beaches while granny wilts from heatstroke.
No mention of the fact that it was really, really hot for a long time. All over the whole continent. (A continent, as P.J. O'Reilly once pointed out, where you can march from the Urals to the Irish Sea and not find an ice cube.)
Mr. Instapundit: I'm new to this blogging game, so fill me in... the point of your post was . . . what, exactly? That the French suck and deserve to die by the thousands? That the heat is caused by the French? They're getting what they deserve for taking vacations? What . . . ???
I just assumed that the cause of all those deaths from heatstroke was actually THE HEAT.
The point of Johnson's article, like Instapundit's post, was presumably that France and Germany suck.
Posted by: Seb | September 28, 2003 at 03:44 PM