Provisional counts of the number of deaths registered in England and Wales, by age, sex, region and Index of Multiple Deprivation (IMD), in the latest weeks for which data are available.

There were 11,607 deaths registered in England and Wales for the week ending February 21, 2025, compared with 12,365 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 in decline since 2020. Between 2020 and 2022, for example, life expectancy at birth fell by 23 weeks for females, and 37 weeks for males.2. 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.

Provisional counts of the number of deaths registered in England and Wales, including deaths involving coronavirus (COVID-19), by local authority, health board and place of death in the latest weeks for which data are available. The occurrence tabs in the 2021 edition of this dataset were updated for the last time on 25 October 2022.

For the week ending March 7, 2025, weekly deaths in England and Wales were 124 below the number expected, compared with 460 fewer than expected in the previous week. In late 2022, and through early 2023, excess deaths were elevated for a number of weeks, with the excess deaths figure for the week ending January 13, 2023, the highest since February 2021. In the middle of April 2020, at the height of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, there were almost 12,000 excess deaths a week recorded in England and Wales. It was not until two months later, in the week ending June 19, 2020, that the number of deaths began to be lower than the five-year average for the corresponding week. Most deaths since 1918 in 2020 In 2020, there were 689,629 deaths in the United Kingdom, making that year the deadliest since 1918, at the height of the Spanish influenza pandemic. As seen in the excess death figures, April 2020 was by far the worst month in terms of deaths during the pandemic. The weekly number of deaths for weeks 16 and 17 of that year were 22,351, and 21,997 respectively. Although the number of deaths fell to more usual levels for the rest of that year, a winter wave of the disease led to a high number of deaths in January 2021, with 18,676 deaths recorded in the fourth week of that year. For the whole of 2021, there were 667,479 deaths in the UK, 22,150 fewer than in 2020. Life expectancy in the UK goes into reverse In 2022, life expectancy at birth for women in the UK was 82.6 years, while for men it was 78.6 years. This was the lowest life expectancy in the country for ten years, and came after life expectancy improvements stalled throughout the 2010s, and then declined from 2020 onwards. There is also quite a significant regional difference in life expectancy in the UK. In the London borough of Kensington and Chelsea, for example, the life expectancy for men was 81.5 years, and 86.5 years for women. By contrast, in Blackpool, in North West England, male life expectancy was just 73.1 years, while for women life expectancy was lowest in Glasgow, at 78 years.

Number of deaths registered each month by area of usual residence for England and Wales, by region, county, health authorities, local and unitary authority, and London borough.

This file contains COVID-19 death counts, death rates, and percent of total deaths by jurisdiction of residence. The data is grouped by different time periods including 3-month period, weekly, and total (cumulative since January 1, 2020). United States death counts and rates include the 50 states, plus the District of Columbia and New York City. New York state estimates exclude New York City. Puerto Rico is included in HHS Region 2 estimates. Deaths with confirmed or presumed COVID-19, coded to ICD–10 code U07.1. Number of deaths reported in this file are the total number of COVID-19 deaths received and coded as of the date of analysis and may not represent all deaths that occurred in that period. Counts of deaths occurring before or after the reporting period are not included in the file. Data during recent periods are incomplete because of the lag in time between when the death occurred and when the death certificate is completed, submitted to NCHS and processed for reporting purposes. This delay can range from 1 week to 8 weeks or more, depending on the jurisdiction and cause of death. Death counts should not be compared across states. Data timeliness varies by state. Some states report deaths on a daily basis, while other states report deaths weekly or monthly. The ten (10) United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) regions include the following jurisdictions. Region 1: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Vermont; Region 2: New Jersey, New York, New York City, Puerto Rico; Region 3: Delaware, District of Columbia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia; Region 4: Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee; Region 5: Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, Wisconsin; Region 6: Arkansas, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas; Region 7: Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska; Region 8: Colorado, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah, Wyoming; Region 9: Arizona, California, Hawaii, Nevada; Region 10: Alaska, Idaho, Oregon, Washington. Rates were calculated using the population estimates for 2021, which are estimated as of July 1, 2021 based on the Blended Base produced by the US Census Bureau in lieu of the April 1, 2020 decennial population count. The Blended Base consists of the blend of Vintage 2020 postcensal population estimates, 2020 Demographic Analysis Estimates, and 2020 Census PL 94-171 Redistricting File (see https://www2.census.gov/programs-surveys/popest/technical-documentation/methodology/2020-2021/methods-statement-v2021.pdf). Rates are based on deaths occurring in the specified week/month and are age-adjusted to the 2000 standard population using the direct method (see https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr70/nvsr70-08-508.pdf). These rates differ from annual age-adjusted rates, typically presented in NCHS publications based on a full year of data and annualized weekly/monthly age-adjusted rates which have been adjusted to allow comparison with annual rates. Annualization rates presents deaths per year per 100,000 population that would be expected in a year if the observed period specific (weekly/monthly) rate prevailed for a full year. Sub-national death counts between 1-9 are suppressed in accordance with NCHS data confidentiality standards. Rates based on death counts less than 20 are suppressed in accordance with NCHS standards of reliability as specified in NCHS Data Presentation Standards for Proportions (available from: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/series/sr_02/sr02_175.pdf.).

In February 2025, there were 48,895 deaths in England and Wales, compared with 50,358 in February 2024. In April 2020, there were 88,038 deaths, which was an increase of almost 40,000 from the month before, and by far the month with the most deaths in this period. The dramatic increase in deaths in April can be attributed to the COVID-19 pandemic, which first hit the UK in early 2020.

Live births by usual residence of mother, and General Fertility Rates (GFR), and Deaths and Standardised Mortality Ratio (SMR) by ward and local authority.

The births and deaths data comes from ONS Vital Statistics Table 4.
Small area data is only available directly from ONS under licence.

The general fertility rate (GFR) is the number of live births per 1,000 women aged 15-44.

SMR measures whether the population of an area has a higher or lower number of deaths than expected based on the age profile of the population (more deaths are expected in older populations). The SMR is defined as follows: SMR = (Observed no. of deaths per year)/(Expected no. of deaths per year).

Rates are provisional, they are based on the GLA 2011 based SHLAA ward projections (standard) released in January 2012. At national level, however, they are based on the mid-year population estimates.

More information is on the ONS website.

There were 667,479 deaths in the United Kingdom in 2021, compared with 689,629 in 2020. Between 2003 and 2011, the annual number of deaths in the UK fell from 612,085 to just over 552,232. Since 2011 however, the annual number of annual deaths in the United Kingdom has steadily grown, with the number recorded in 2020, the highest since 1918 when there were 715,246 deaths. Both of these spikes in the number of deaths can be attributed to infectious disease pandemics. The great influenza pandemic of 1918, which was at its height towards the end of World War One, and the COVID-19 pandemic, which caused a large number of deaths in 2020.  Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic The weekly death figures for England and Wales highlight the tragic toll of the COVID-19 pandemic. In two weeks in April of 2020, there were 22,351 and 21,997 deaths respectively, almost 12,000 excess deaths in each of those weeks. Although hospitals were the most common location of these deaths, a significant number of these deaths also took place in care homes, with 7,911 deaths taking place in care homes for the week ending April 24, 2020, far higher than usual. By the summer of 2020, the number of deaths in England and Wales reached more usual levels, before a second wave of excess deaths hit the country in early 2021. Although subsequent waves of COVID-19 cases resulted in far fewer deaths, the number of excess deaths remained elevated throughout 2022. Long-term life expectancy trends As of 2022 the life expectancy for men in the United Kingdom was 78.57, and almost 82.57 for women, compared with life expectancies of 75 for men and 80 for women in 2002. In historical terms, this is a major improvement in relation to the mid 18th century, when the overall life expectancy was just under 39 years. Between 2011 and 2017, improvements in life expectancy in the UK did start to decline, and have gone into reverse since 2018/20. Between 2020 and 2022 for example, life expectancy for men in the UK has fallen by over 37 weeks, and by almost 23 weeks for women, when compared with the previous year.

Provisional counts of the number of care home resident deaths registered in England and Wales, by region, including deaths involving coronavirus (COVID-19), in the latest weeks for which data are available.

Based on a comparison of coronavirus deaths in 210 countries relative to their population, Peru had the most losses to COVID-19 up until July 13, 2022. As of the same date, the virus had infected over 557.8 million people worldwide, and the number of deaths had totaled more than 6.3 million. Note, however, that COVID-19 test rates can vary per country. Additionally, big differences show up between countries when combining the number of deaths against confirmed COVID-19 cases. The source seemingly does not differentiate between "the Wuhan strain" (2019-nCOV) of COVID-19, "the Kent mutation" (B.1.1.7) that appeared in the UK in late 2020, the 2021 Delta variant (B.1.617.2) from India or the Omicron variant (B.1.1.529) from South Africa.

The difficulties of death figures

This table aims to provide a complete picture on the topic, but it very much relies on data that has become more difficult to compare. As the coronavirus pandemic developed across the world, countries already used different methods to count fatalities, and they sometimes changed them during the course of the pandemic. On April 16, for example, the Chinese city of Wuhan added a 50 percent increase in their death figures to account for community deaths. These deaths occurred outside of hospitals and went unaccounted for so far. The state of New York did something similar two days before, revising their figures with 3,700 new deaths as they started to include “assumed” coronavirus victims. The United Kingdom started counting deaths in care homes and private households on April 29, adjusting their number with about 5,000 new deaths (which were corrected lowered again by the same amount on August 18). This makes an already difficult comparison even more difficult. Belgium, for example, counts suspected coronavirus deaths in their figures, whereas other countries have not done that (yet). This means two things. First, it could have a big impact on both current as well as future figures. On April 16 already, UK health experts stated that if their numbers were corrected for community deaths like in Wuhan, the UK number would change from 205 to “above 300”. This is exactly what happened two weeks later. Second, it is difficult to pinpoint exactly which countries already have “revised” numbers (like Belgium, Wuhan or New York) and which ones do not. One work-around could be to look at (freely accessible) timelines that track the reported daily increase of deaths in certain countries. Several of these are available on our platform, such as for Belgium, Italy and Sweden. A sudden large increase might be an indicator that the domestic sources changed their methodology.

Where are these numbers coming from?

The numbers shown here were collected by Johns Hopkins University, a source that manually checks the data with domestic health authorities. For the majority of countries, this is from national authorities. In some cases, like China, the United States, Canada or Australia, city reports or other various state authorities were consulted. In this statistic, these separately reported numbers were put together. For more information or other freely accessible content, please visit our dedicated Facts and Figures page.

This file contains COVID-19 death counts and rates by month and year of death, jurisdiction of residence (U.S., HHS Region) and demographic characteristics (sex, age, race and Hispanic origin, and age/race and Hispanic origin). United States death counts and rates include the 50 states, plus the District of Columbia.

Deaths with confirmed or presumed COVID-19, coded to ICD–10 code U07.1. Number of deaths reported in this file are the total number of COVID-19 deaths received and coded as of the date of analysis and may not represent all deaths that occurred in that period. Counts of deaths occurring before or after the reporting period are not included in the file.

Data during recent periods are incomplete because of the lag in time between when the death occurred and when the death certificate is completed, submitted to NCHS and processed for reporting purposes. This delay can range from 1 week to 8 weeks or more, depending on the jurisdiction and cause of death.

Death counts should not be compared across jurisdictions. Data timeliness varies by state. Some states report deaths on a daily basis, while other states report deaths weekly or monthly.

The ten (10) United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) regions include the following jurisdictions. Region 1: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Vermont; Region 2: New Jersey, New York; Region 3: Delaware, District of Columbia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia; Region 4: Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee; Region 5: Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, Wisconsin; Region 6: Arkansas, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas; Region 7: Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska; Region 8: Colorado, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah, Wyoming; Region 9: Arizona, California, Hawaii, Nevada; Region 10: Alaska, Idaho, Oregon, Washington.

Rates were calculated using the population estimates for 2021, which are estimated as of July 1, 2021 based on the Blended Base produced by the US Census Bureau in lieu of the April 1, 2020 decennial population count. The Blended Base consists of the blend of Vintage 2020 postcensal population estimates, 2020 Demographic Analysis Estimates, and 2020 Census PL 94-171 Redistricting File (see https://www2.census.gov/programs-surveys/popest/technical-documentation/methodology/2020-2021/methods-statement-v2021.pdf).

Rate are based on deaths occurring in the specified week and are age-adjusted to the 2000 standard population using the direct method (see https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr70/nvsr70-08-508.pdf). These rates differ from annual age-adjusted rates, typically presented in NCHS publications based on a full year of data and annualized weekly age-adjusted rates which have been adjusted to allow comparison with annual rates. Annualization rates presents deaths per year per 100,000 population that would be expected in a year if the observed period specific (weekly) rate prevailed for a full year.

Sub-national death counts between 1-9 are suppressed in accordance with NCHS data confidentiality standards. Rates based on death counts less than 20 are suppressed in accordance with NCHS standards of reliability as specified in NCHS Data Presentation Standards for Proportions (available from: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/series/sr_02/sr02_175.pdf.).

This dataset presents the latest data on all-cause death statistics, excess mortality and COVID-19 deaths, by week, for all OECD countries for which data are available. Please refer to the Methodological Note below for details on methods of calculation and caution regarding cross-country comparisons. Sources by country are available in a separate file in Excel format.

• Read the Methodological Note All-cause, Excess and COVID-19 deaths
• Access additional information on sources by country

WARNING: Reporting of the number of All-cause and COVID-19 deaths particularly for the most recent weeks may be only partial and subject to significant revision. The calculated values for excess deaths for the most recent weeks are therefore also subject to significant revision.

On March 4, 2020, the first death as a result of coronavirus (COVID-19) was recorded in the United Kingdom (UK). The number of deaths in the UK has increased significantly since then. As of January 13, 2023, the number of confirmed deaths due to coronavirus in the UK amounted to 202,157. On January 21, 2021, 1,370 deaths were recorded, which was the highest total in single day in the UK since the outbreak began.

Number of deaths among highest in Europe
The UK has had the highest number of deaths from coronavirus in western Europe. In terms of rate of coronavirus deaths, the UK has recorded 297.8 deaths per 100,000 population.

Cases in the UK The number of confirmed cases of coronavirus in the UK was 24,243,393 as of January 13, 2023. The South East has the highest number of first-episode confirmed cases of the virus in the UK with 3,123,050 cases, while London and the North West have 2,912,859 and 2,580,090 confirmed cases respectively. As of January 16, the UK has had 50 new cases per 100,000 in the last seven days.

For further information about the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, please visit our dedicated Facts and Figures page.

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.

The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in an increase in the global death rate, but had little to no significant impact on birth rates, causing population growth to dip slightly. On a global level, population growth is determined by the difference between the birth and death rate, and this is known as the rate of natural change - on a national or regional level, population change is also affected by migration. Ongoing trends Since the middle of the 20th century, the global birth rate has been well above the global death rate, however, the gap between these figures has grown closer in recent years. The death rate is projected to overtake the birth rate in the 2080s, which means that the world's population will then go into decline. In the future, death rates will increase due to ageing populations across the world and a plateau in life expectancy. Why does this change? There are many reasons for falling death and birth rates in recent decades. Falling death rates have been driven by a reduction in infant and child mortality, as well as increased life expectancy. Falling birth rates were also driven by the reduction in child mortality, whereby mothers would have fewer children as survival rates rose - other factors include the drop in child marriage, improved contraception access and efficacy, and women choosing to have children later in life.

Effective September 27, 2023, this dataset will no longer be updated. Similar data are accessible from wonder.cdc.gov.

This visualization provides weekly data on the number of deaths by jurisdiction of occurrence and cause of death. Counts of deaths in more recent weeks can be compared with counts from earlier years to determine if the number is higher than expected. Selected causes of death are shown, based on analyses of the most prevalent comorbid conditions reported on death certificates where COVID-19 was listed as a cause of death (see https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid_weekly/index.htm#Comorbidities). Cause of death counts are based on the underlying cause of death, and presented for Respiratory diseases, Circulatory diseases, Malignant neoplasms, and Alzheimer disease and dementia. Estimated numbers of deaths due to these other causes of death could represent misclassified COVID-19 deaths, or potentially could be indirectly related to COVID-19 (e.g., deaths from other causes occurring in the context of health care shortages or overburdened health care systems). Deaths with an underlying cause of death of COVID-19 are not included in these estimates of deaths due to other causes. Deaths due to external causes (i.e. injuries) or unknown causes are excluded. For more detail, see the Technical Notes.