Registered leading causes of death by age, sex and country, UK, 2001 to 2018

In 2018 there were over 40 thousand deaths caused by ischaemic heart diseases in the United Kingdom, making it the leading cause of death in that year. Since 2001 there has been a noticeable increase in the number of people dying from dementia or alzheimers, which caused 26.5 thousand deaths in 2018, an increase of almost ten thousand when compared with 2012.

Mortality from leading causes of death by ethnic group, England and Wales, 2012 to 2019.

The Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (OHID) has updated the mortality profile.

The profile brings together a selection of mortality indicators, including from other OHID data tools such as the https://fingertips.phe.org.uk/profile/public-health-outcomes-framework/data" class="govuk-link">Public Health Outcomes Framework, making it easier to assess outcomes across a range of causes of death.

For the March 2023 update, 12 new indicators have been added to the profile:

• mortality rate for deaths due to COVID-19, all ages
• under 75 mortality rate for deaths due to COVID-19
• mortality rate from all cardiovascular diseases, all ages
• mortality rate from heart disease, all ages
• mortality rate from stroke, all ages
• mortality rate from cancer, all ages
• mortality rate from breast cancer, all ages
• mortality rate from colorectal cancer, all ages
• mortality rate from liver disease, all ages
• mortality rate from respiratory disease, all ages
• under 75 mortality rate from lung cancer
• mortality rate from dementia and Alzheimer’s disease, all ages

If you would like to send us feedback on the tool please contact pha-ohid@dhsc.gov.uk.

Annual data on deaths registered by age, sex and selected underlying cause of death. Tables also provide both mortality rates and numbers of deaths over time.

Leading causes of death by age group and sex Source agency: Office for National Statistics Designation: Official Statistics not designated as National Statistics Language: English Alternative title: Mortality

In 1948, over a quarter of deaths recorded in England and Wales were caused by heart disease. The National Health Service was founded in this year in the UK and aimed at improving the health of British citizens.

There were 9.7 homicides for every million people in England and Wales in 2023/24, unchanged from the previous year, but a decline when compared to 2021/22, when the rate was 11.6. In 2022/23, the homicide rate among UK jurisdictions was highest in Scotland, at 10.4 homicides per million people, and lowest in Northern Ireland, which had a homicide rate of 6.8. Throughout this provided time period, the homicide rate for Scotland has declined substantially. From 2003/04 to 2013/14, Scotland had the highest homicide rate among UK jurisdictions, with a peak of 27 homicides per million people recorded in 2004/05. Uptick in violent crimes since the mid-2010s In 2002/03, there were 1,047 homicides in England and Wales, but by 2013/14 this had fallen to just 533, with similar declines also evident in Scotland and Northern Ireland. Unlike the in the latter two jurisdictions, however, there was a noticeable uptick in homicides in England and Wales from 2016/17 onwards, with 720 recorded in 2019/20. Additionally, there has been a surge in violence against the person offences in England and Wales, rising from around 600,000 in 2012/13, to more than 2.1 million ten years later in 2022/23. It is unclear what exactly is driving this trend, but in an attempt to reverse it, the UK government has started to increase the manpower and funding available to UK police forces. Struggles of the UK justice system Recent boosts to police funding come after almost a decade of austerity was imposed on most public services. Although some government departments were protected from this, the Ministry of Justice saw its budget decline from 9.1 billion pounds in 2009/10,to just 7.35 billion pounds in 2015/16. Although the Justice Budget has also increased recently, there are several signs that the system as a whole is under pressure. There is a significant backlog of cases at Crown Courts in England and Wales, with serious offences taking an average of almost two years to pass through the court system. Meanwhile, prisons are struggling with severe capacity issues, along with upticks in violence and self-harm.

There were 2,784 infant deaths in the United Kingdom in 2021, compared with 2,620 in the previous year. The number of infant deaths in 2020 was the fewest in the provided time period, especially compared with 1900 when there were 163,470 infant deaths.

The percentage of extra deaths that occurred due to winter, including those that had COVID-19 mentioned on the death certificate. The Excess Winter Mortality (EWM) index is calculated as the number of excess winter deaths divided by the average non-winter deaths, expressed as a percentage. Calculated so that comparisons can be made between sexes, age groups, and regions.

An EWM index of 20 shows that there were 20 percent more deaths in winter compared with the non-winter period. Provisional figures at country and region level are produced for the most recent winter using estimation methods, and so are rounded to the nearest 100 deaths. Data post 2019/20 should be treated with caution due to high numbers of deaths from COVID-19 in the summer period.

For data years 2020/21 onwards, instances where the number of winter deaths compared to non-winter deaths were equal to zero or a negative value, an EWM index is presented. (For earlier years, the EWM index was removed). A zero value for winter deaths compared to non-winter deaths is often affected by rounding, so in these instances, the winter mortality index can either be a positive or negative value. A negative winter mortality index means there were a higher number of deaths in the non-winter periods than the winter period.

Alternatively, figures are available for deaths excluding COVID-19, calculated using all-cause deaths that did not have COVID-19 mentioned on the death certificate.

Data is Powered by LG Inform Plus and automatically checked for new data on the 3rd of each month.

Annual age-standardised and age-specific mortality rates by leading causes of death for England and Wales, 2001 to 2018 (Experimental Statistics)

Leading causes of death by age group and sex

Source agency: Office for National Statistics

Designation: Official Statistics not designated as National Statistics

Language: English

Alternative title: Mortality

Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner. This study comprises a complete transcription of all the district-level tables which are the main contents of each of the Registrar-General for England and Wales Decennial Supplements from 1851-60 to 1901-10; these are supplements to the 25th, 35th, 45th, 55th, 65th and 75th Annual Reports. The reports for 1851-1900 were computerised by a project led by Professor Robert Woods of Liverpool University, creating a large set of spreadsheets, one for each district in each decade. These were assembled into a single large file by the Great Britain Historical GIS, working in collaboration with Hamish James of the UK Data Archive. The GBHGIS team computerised the 1901-10 report, checked all data against the original reports, and added identifiers linking the districts to the digital boundary data they had created. For each district in each decade, the reports cross-tabulate causes of death against age. In some decades, there are separate tables for each district for males and females, and the causes of death vary between decades. There were c. 630 districts, the exact number varying by decade. Main Topics: Decennial cause of death data for Registration Districts in England and Wales cross-classified by age and sometimes by sex. The study also includes a separate table, mainly derived, containing age- and gender-specific counts of deaths, without cause information and organised to simplify calculation of standardised mortality rates.

There were 9,428 deaths registered in England and Wales for the week ending August 15, 2025, compared with 9,923 in the previous week. During this time period, the two weeks with the highest number of weekly deaths were in April 2020, with the week ending April 17, 2020, having 22,351 deaths, and the following week 21,997 deaths, a direct result of the COVID-19 pandemic in the UK. Death and life expectancy As of 2022, the life expectancy for women in the UK was just over 82.5 years, and almost 78.6 years for men. Compared with 1765, when average life expectancy was under 39 years, this is a huge improvement in historical terms. Even in the more recent past, life expectancy was less than 47 years at the start of the 20th Century, and was under 70 as recently as the 1950s. Despite these significant developments in the long-term, improvements in life expectancy stalled between 2009/11 and 2015/17, and have even gone into decline since 2020. Between 2020 and 2022, for example, life expectancy at birth fell by 23 weeks for females, and 37 weeks for males. COVID-19 in the UK The first cases of COVID-19 in the United Kingdom were recorded on January 31, 2020, but it was not until a month later that cases began to rise exponentially. By March 5 of this year there were more than 100 cases, rising to 1,000 days later and passing 10,000 cumulative cases by March 26. At the height of the pandemic in late April and early May, there were around six thousand new cases being recorded daily. As of January 2023, there were more than 24.2 million confirmed cumulative cases of COVID-19 recorded in the United Kingdom, resulting in 202,156 deaths.

Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner. The aim of this project was to analyse the changing geography of mortality decline in England and Wales between 1851 and 1911 via the cause of death by age data for registration districts published in the Registrar General's Decennial Supplements. Main Topics: 1851-1860 and 1861-1870 Mean population by registration district and sex, total deaths by registration district and sex, causes of death by registration district, sex and age group. 1871-1880 Mean population by registration district and sex, total deaths by registration district and sex, causes of death by registration district and age group, total marriages, total births. 1881-1890 and 1891-1900 Mean population by registration district and sex, total deaths by registration district and sex, causes of death by registration district and sex, causes of death by registration district and age group, total marriages, total births. Please note: this study does not include information on named individuals and would therefore not be useful for personal family history research.

United Kingdom UK: Cause of Death: by Communicable Diseases & Maternal, Prenatal & Nutrition Conditions: % of Total data was reported at 7.700 % in 2016. This records a decrease from the previous number of 8.000 % for 2015. United Kingdom UK: Cause of Death: by Communicable Diseases & Maternal, Prenatal & Nutrition Conditions: % of Total data is updated yearly, averaging 7.850 % from Dec 2000 (Median) to 2016, with 4 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 11.800 % in 2000 and a record low of 7.300 % in 2010. United Kingdom UK: Cause of Death: by Communicable Diseases & Maternal, Prenatal & Nutrition Conditions: % of Total data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by World Bank. The data is categorized under Global Database’s United Kingdom – Table UK.World Bank.WDI: Health Statistics. Cause of death refers to the share of all deaths for all ages by underlying causes. Communicable diseases and maternal, prenatal and nutrition conditions include infectious and parasitic diseases, respiratory infections, and nutritional deficiencies such as underweight and stunting.; ; Derived based on the data from WHO's Global Health Estimates.; Weighted average;

This data shows premature deaths (Age under 75) from all Cancers, numbers and rates by gender, as 3-year moving-averages. Cancers are a major cause of premature deaths. Inequalities exist in cancer rates between the most deprived areas and the most affluent areas. Directly Age-Standardised Rates (DASR) are shown in the data (where numbers are sufficient) so that death rates can be directly compared between areas. The DASR calculation applies Age-specific rates to a Standard (European) population to cancel out possible effects on crude rates due to different age structures among populations, thus enabling direct comparisons of rates. A limitation on using mortalities as a proxy for prevalence of health conditions is that mortalities may give an incomplete view of health conditions in an area, as ill-health might not lead to premature death. Data source: Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (OHID), indicator ID 40501, E05a. This data is updated annually.