2020 Mortality Statistics

The statistics on the causes of death in the U.S. always take a year or more to collect because every state and the District of Columbia forwards the death certificates with the cause of death to the National Center for Health Statistics Vital Statistics System for review and compilation. You can see why it would take a year. However, with the ongoing pandemic, it’s critical to get a provisional count of the number of deaths and the causes. You can read the JAMA Letter yourself at the link below.

The total number of deaths rose to 3,358,814, an increase of just over 500,000 people. The leading cause of death remains heart disease which rose by 31,000 deaths to 690,882. Cancer deaths decreased slightly, but cancer was still the cause of 599,000 deaths. The next cause of death was attributed to COVID-19 coming in at just over 345,000.

Were there any real surprises? Not for me. It does raise some questions, and I’ll address those on Saturday.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Reference: JAMA. doi:10.1001/jama.2021.5469