The figure was quoted in a preliminary report by the official National Health Institute which is due to be released on Thursday, Lusa said.

In the report Doctor Ricardo Jorge wrote that 1,316 more people died in the country between the end of July and August 12 than in the same period of 2002.

In common with several other European countries, Portugal was hard hit by the heatwave, which caused both devastating fires and an increase in deaths among vulnerable sections of the population, notably old people.

The heatwave was the longest and hottest in Portugal since records began in 1856, with temperatures soaring above 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) throughout much of the country between July 29 and August 13.

Portugal suffered the highest temperatures in Europe, recording a mighty 47.3 degrees Celsius (117.1 degrees Fahrenheit) on August 1 in the white-walled town of Amarelejo on the Spanish border.

The hot weather fueled wildfires which claimed 18 lives, including that of two firefighters, and caused nearly one billion euros (1.1 billion dollars) in damage.

The heat also set records for water and electricity consumption and packed beaches near the Portuguese capital at night as people fought to stay cool.

The report said the number of deaths from the heat in Portugal were less than during a 10-day heatwave in 1981, when 1,900 people died, because of emergency measures put in place by the health ministry.

When the hot weather began, the ministry issued a warning for elderly people to avoid walking outside in the hours of the most heat and to drink plenty of water.

A special hotline was also set up for people to call with questions if they suspected they were suffering health problems because of the heat, which received more than 1,800 calls.

But the measures have already been blasted by some critics as insufficient.

"We are very unprepared in this field. We still do not have an emergency plan to minimize the harmful effects caused by a a heatwave," meteorologist Manuel Costa Alves told private radio TSF.

He said the government should have launched a more aggressive television campaign to warn people of the health risks from the extreme heat and ensured that health workers visited the elderly to check on their well-being.

"We have not learned anything since the heatwave of 1991," said Alves.

A major political scandal has broken out in France as it has emerged that the death toll in the heatwave could top 10,000, many of the victims elderly and living alone.

TERRA.WIRE