There are many different statistics to look at about a country, the birth rates, financials, health statistics, and so on.
One of those statistics is the mortality, and even though it seems like it is not an important statistic to look at where a country stands, it can actually reveal a bunch of stuff that you weren’t aware of before.
You can see whether the crime takes more lives or the disease and if it is a disease, what kind of diseases are people more prone to dying from, and is there any national or global risk that you can associate those disease mortality rates?
All this information is hidden within mortality statistics, and we will take a look at Mortality statistics for the US, one of the biggest countries in the world. What are the mortality statistics in the US in 2023?
A Peek At the Overall Mortality Numbers
The official complete mortality statistics for 2023 are not there yet, but NCHS has not yet confirmed the provisional numbers where the numbers come from death certificates.
According to these numbers, in 2021, about 3.5 million people have passed away in the United States. This is about 840 deaths per 100,000 population.
The increase from the year before was around 0.7%. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the highest death rate was those who were older than 85 years old.
The lowest death rate in general among the public was in children aged 5-14 years.
The death numbers by gender show that more males died than men in 2021, and these patterns didn’t change when we compare them to 2020.
The third-largest underlying cause of the deaths in 2021 was COVID-19, similar to 2020. In 2021, 460 thousand people died from COVID-19 disease.
Also Read: US Population Statistics
Crime Mortality
When we look at the mortality rates occurring due to any kind of crime, including unintentional injuries, we don’t see many of those mortality types on the list.
The only crime mortality we see in the 2021 mortality statistics is unintentional injuries which was the fourth leading cause of deaths both in 2021 and 2020.
Disease Mortality
Most of the mortalities in 2021 were due to illnesses such as heart diseases, cancer, and COVID-19. These three are respectively in the top three causes of death in 2021.
About 14% of all the deaths in 2021 occurred due to COVID-19, and with 700,00 deaths, about 25% of all deaths occurred because of heart diseases.
US Mortality Statistics By Year
| Year | Statistics |
|---|---|
| 2000 | 869 |
| 2005 | 815 |
| 2010 | 747 |
| 2017 | 731 |
| 2018 | 723 |
You May Also Read: US Crime Statistics
US Mortality Statistics by Gender per 100,000 population
| Year | Female | Male |
|---|---|---|
| 2000 | 731.4 | 1,053.8 |
| 2005 | 692.3 | 971.9 |
| 2010 | 634.9 | 887.1 |
| 2017 | 619.7 | 864.5 |
| 2018 | 611.3 | 855.5 |
US Mortality Statistics by Cause per 100,000
| Year | Heart Diseases | Influenza | Chronic Diseases | Suicide | Homicide |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2000 | 210.9 | 20.7 | 6.2 | 4 | 2.8 |
| 2005 | 177.5 | 18.6 | 5.8 | 4.4 | 2.5 |
| 2010 | 143.3 | 13.1 | 6.2 | 5 | 2.3 |
| 2017 | 129.6 | 12.7 | 7.6 | 6.1 | 2.5 |
| 2018 | 127.9 | 13.1 | 7.7 | 6.2 | 2.5 |
The Verdict
To conclude, mortality statistics in 2023 in the US, even though they are provisional as of now, show the general picture of deaths in the country.
The biggest causes of death are physical diseases such as heart, cancer, and COVID-19.
Only one crime-related injury takes up space in the mortality statistics, and that death is not fully related to crime as they are classified as unintentional injuries, which could mean someone hurting themselves or their friends accidentally.
Overall, there was a 0.7% increase in death rates in 2021 when we compare it to 2020, the year prior.
Source
Shefali Jain is a Content Writer & Editor at USWorkforce.org
After completing her graduation in hospitality, Shefali decided to follow her passion and started writing. Shefali has been writing for two years now and contributes to our website as a skilled editor and content writer with strong research skills. Writing product and service reviews, biographies, and book reviews are some of her key areas, among many others in which she specializes. In her time at the organization, she has written and edited content on a range of topics, including employment law, human resources, and business management.