diff --git a/src/common/evtloopcmn.cpp b/src/common/evtloopcmn.cpp
index ee1244ff4b..d04d05383f 100644
--- a/src/common/evtloopcmn.cpp
+++ b/src/common/evtloopcmn.cpp
@@ -34,7 +34,7 @@
 // src/msw/thread.cpp for the explanation of this hack
 #ifdef __WXMSW__
 
-extern int wxRunningEventLoopCount;
+extern WXDLLIMPEXP_DATA_BASE(int) wxRunningEventLoopCount;
 struct wxRunningEventLoopCounter
 {
     wxRunningEventLoopCounter() { wxRunningEventLoopCount++; }
diff --git a/src/msw/thread.cpp b/src/msw/thread.cpp
index d6115306bb..a8826baed7 100644
--- a/src/msw/thread.cpp
+++ b/src/msw/thread.cpp
@@ -94,7 +94,7 @@
 // the proper solution is to use wxAppTraits to abstract the base/GUI-dependent
 // operation of waiting for the thread to terminate and is already implemented
 // in cvs HEAD, this is just a backwards compatible hack for 2.8
-int wxRunningEventLoopCount = 0;
+WXDLLIMPEXP_DATA_BASE(int) wxRunningEventLoopCount = 0;
 
 // ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 // constants