A 75-year-old woman who died two days later also succumbed to heat stroke, he added.

This brings to nine the number of people to have died as a direct consequence of the heatwave.

A 40-year-old German man who was on the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage also died from heat stroke in Extremadura, as did an 81-year-old man.

Parts of the region registered temperatures of up to 46 degrees Celsius (115 degrees Fahrenheit) at the weekend.

Over in the northeast in Catalonia, three homeless men have died.

Two other men -- a roadworker in his 40s and a 78-year-old pensioner tending to his vegetable garden -- also passed away from heatstroke last week.