Please take into account the huge humidity factor when writing such articles. The UK has some of the harshest weather in the world. -30 and dry in Sweden cannot be compared with +1, damp and draughty here. If one is cold and damp then that's arguably worse since the skin has to cook off the humidity, that's how sweating works. Add the wind chill to the scenario and you've got extreme cold - not in temperature but the effect it has on the body. The rain/dampness then causes problems such as leaks and rotting in buildings much more often than in drier climes. Until we stop measuring "coldness" by temperature alone we will never realise how cold the UK really is and hence will be unable to protect our people properly. Arguably in terms of fatalities, it's colder here and that's a fact as this article correctly quotes. It's just a different type of cold which is much harder to deal with. It's harder to build for, harder to repair under (waiting for a dry day) and difficult to dress for since it's a more rapidly changing and dynamic winter than elsewhere as the humidity and wind chill factors vary requiring layers to be worn due to such unpredictability.