Protesters from Extinction Rebellion performed a ‘die-in’ at Barclays Bank in Reading to link fossil fuel funding to climate change and global deaths.
Extinction Rebellion says: “Around the world, millions of people are dying as a result of heatwaves, wildfires, torrential rain, drought, flooding and landslides, all caused by changes in our climate brought about by the constant increase in greenhouse gas emissions.
“Barclays Bank is still funding fossil fuel projects which contribute to climate change, thus indirectly contributing to the deaths of humans and wildlife.
“Analyses from the World Weather Attribution organisation show that extreme weather is becoming more likely due to climate change.
“Heatwaves are the deadliest type of extreme weather globally, contributing to at least 500,00 deaths a year, including some in the UK. Researchers from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) and Imperial College London, estimate that high heat killed 2,300 people across 12 major cities as temperatures soared across Europe this summer. They attributed 1,500 of the deaths to climate breakdown, which is heating the planet and making the worst extremes even hotter.”
Dr Ben Clarke, researcher at the Centre for Environmental Policy at Imperial College London, said: “Heatwaves don’t leave a trail of destruction like wildfires or storms. Their impacts are mostly invisible but quietly devastating – a change of just 2 or 3C can mean the difference between life and death for thousands of people.’ He warned that countries need to speed up the transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy.
Greece, Turkey and Cyprus suffered devastating wildfires. Greece experienced a heatwave above 45C, drought and strong winds. At least 17 lives were lost, including 10 firefighters and rescue workers.
An intense two-week heatwave in Norway, Finland and Sweden was hotter, with temperatures of 30C and more, resulting in many more hospital admissions.
A new study, published in the medical journal JAMA, links more than 400 additional deaths to the wildfires in Los Angeles earlier this year. The study comes as hundreds of wildfires burn across the US and Canada.
Climate change not only increases the risk of wildfires around the world but also makes them particularly explosive. Relatively small blazes rapidly “blow up” so suddenly and with such ferocity that they become difficult to control.
Climate change also intensified heavy monsoon rain in Pakistan, which suffered its worst floods on record, killing hundreds of people.
In late June 2025, several days of heavy rainfall swept across Colombia and Venezuela, causing widespread flooding, overflowing rivers, and numerous landslides, one of which killed 27 people.
Moscow suffered its worst flooding since 1879, with some parts experiencing far more than the monthly average.
These extreme weather events will only continue to become worse if governments do not do more to reduce emissions from greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide and methane.
Extinction Rebellion will pose as dead bodies (a ‘die-in’) to remind people of how they say that Barclays continues to fund projects that are contributing to over-heating planet Earth. Extinction Rebellion also says that they also hope to encourage visitors to the branch to move their accounts from Barclays to other banks with much ‘greener’ credentials.
