I think people dying out of cold vs. hot are different segments.
Ignoring really harsh climates like Siberia, so in UK and similar, it's much simpler to protect oneself from cold vs. hot. So dying out of cold means total homelessness, lack of any kind of shelter, lack of clothes, lack of motivation to harvest some cardboard boxes or used clothes out of trash - basically, total inability to live. Probably many who died out of cold in statistics would have died out of drugs or alcohol if not cold.
But ignoring the danger of heat can easily be explained by much smaller motivational issues, like "I don't want to invest in air conditioner, it's just a few weeks a year, besides it consumes a lot of power, and I have been on this planet for 85 years, bloody youngsters and their toys".
But we are getting back to this again, people in UK should be aggressively installing air-to-air heatpumps whenever possible, as they will significantly ease the energy problem during winter, and also help during summer. Of course it is then tempting to use a lot of energy to provide comfortable cooling but the net effect is still positive.
The problem in the UK is, a lot of old and vulnerable people live in homes with inadequate insulation and can't afford high fuel bills. It's obviously easier to keep warm when it's cold, than cool, when it's hot but the UK still gets many more cold days vs hot. The
figures I posted above still shows death from cold is still more likely, than due to heat. I accept it's not solid data, but a ratio of 2 deaths from the cold, for every death from heat makes sense, given our climate. This might change in the future.
The fact is heat pumps don't make financial sense. A heat pump installation costs 10 times the price, compared an efficient gas boiler. Gas is much cheaper than electricity, so a heat pump isn't even cheaper to run. Perhaps this might change in future, especially for new builds, as a lot of the cost is ripping everything out and starting again. I certainly wouldn't consider a heat pump. I don't have a hot water cylinder and I don't even use hot water very often. I take cold showers most of the time and have found modern detergents are good enough to wast my dishes in cold water, or I'll just boil the kettle.
We need to work on improving insulation, which will provide protection against both hot and cold. Here's a photograph of the loft insulation in my house and my parents'. My parents' house did come with some insulation, but they upgraded it around 25 years ago. They both look pretty similar, even though my house was build in 2016 and my parents' back in the 1950s.
EDIT:
This is odd, the picture of the insulation in my parents' house has been flipped 180 degrees by the forum software. I checked the original file and it's the right way up. I don't know why it's upside down here.
