Wednesday 6 March 2019

Top 10 Causes Of Global Deaths

On average, the Global birth rate is 131 million per year while the average death rate is 56 million annually which my calculator shows is averaging a surplus of 75 million of us, give or take a few.
It is an unfortunate fact that death comes to us all at some point and that some point averages out at around 71 and the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) have worked out the most likely causes of death.
The biggest killer is cardiovascular disease, which affects the heart and arteries and kills 32.3% of us, double the amount of deaths by various types of Cancer (16.3%). 
Respiratory Diseases such as Asthma, Emphysema and Pneumonia claim 6.5%, Diabetes 5.8%, Lower Respiratory Diseases like Bronchitis and Edema account for 4.4%, Dementia 4.4, Neonatal death before the baby reaches 28 days take 3.2%, Diarrhoeal diseases 3%, Road injuries 2.5%,
Liver disease 2.3%.
While the cause of death varies from country to country, the deaths that preoccupy us the most such as terrorism, war and natural disasters make up less than 0.5% of all deaths combined. Globally, twice as many people die by suicide than by murder.
It may make for a sad picture but compared to previous centuries we have made a huge leap in how, when and why we die and improvements in sanitation, hygiene, nutrition, vaccination and basic healthcare are all part of it but we still have a long way to go when Diarrhoea is in the top 10 of the largest global killers and 1.8 million newborns don't make it past 28 days.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

to summarize the deaths data you present:

91.00 are due to heart failure, cancer, lung failure, brain failure, liver failure.
xx.xx due to accidental deaths like drowning, falling, poisoning, and other illness.
06.00 diarrhea and neonatal issues.
02.50 auto deaths.
00.01 suicide and murder.
00.005 war and natural disasters. Seems like quite a lot to hoot about.

Statistically, there is not much more improvement to be gained.

It is usually easy to make an 80% improvement.
It is usually hard to advance from 80% to 97%.
It is usually impractical to improve from 97% to 99%.
It is usually impossible to improve from 99% to 100%.

Though, the last two facts of life do not usually impede the left.





Falling on a bruise said...

It doesn't break it down any further but would be interesting to see how many are due to lifestyle, especially diabetes and respiratory diseases and cancers. Diarrhoeal diseases is the surprising one but i guess that is mainly third world countries making up the bulk of them deaths.