Extreme Heat Is Killing Europe’s Workers Despite New Laws (4)

Montse Aguilar was a healthy 51-year-old woman when she started her shift cleaning streets in Barcelona at around 2:30 p.m. on June 28. The Spanish city was under alert for high temperatures amid a brutal heat wave that brought record temperatures for that time of the year across the country. She was responsible for sweeping one of the hottest, dirtiest and more touristic areas — the Raval district.

At the end of the shift, at around 9:30 p.m., she walked back home and asked her elderly mother to prepare dinner because she wasn’t feeling well. She also messaged a friend ...