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Provisional Mortality Statistics

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Provisional deaths data for measuring changes in patterns of mortality

Reference period

Jan - Jun 2023

Released

22/09/2023

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Key statistics

There were 15,843 deaths which occurred in June 2023. This is 7.6% less than in June 2022.
Between January and June 2023, there were 89,497 deaths. This is 4.3% less than in 2022.
COVID-19 caused 302 deaths in July, down from 568 in June.

This release of the Provisional Mortality Statistics report contains summary mortality statistics only. As previously advertised, detailed Provisional Mortality Statistics releases will change to every 2 months, with summary statistics being produced for the alternate months.

Australian deaths by week

All-cause deaths

In 2023, there were 89,497 deaths that occurred by 30 June and were registered by 31 August. This is 10,289 deaths (13.0%) more than the baseline average, but 4,036 (4.3%) less than in 2022.
In June 2023 there were 15,843 deaths, 10.4% more than the baseline average but 7.6% less than in 2022.
14,031 of the deaths occurring in June 2023 were doctor certified and 1,812 were coroner referred.

Deaths are presented by counts only. Counts of death do not account for changes in population.

All deaths, Australia, 3 January 2022 - 25 June 2023 vs baseline benchmarks
	baseline range	2023 deaths	2022 deaths	baseline average deaths
Week 1	2819\|3030	3,483	3,334	2,928
Week 2	2828\|2997	3,281	3,740	2,918
Week 3	2764\|3150	3,318	3,892	2,940
Week 4	2883\|2957	3,208	3,786	2,918
Week 5	2745\|3072	3,358	3,745	2,898
Week 6	2724\|2963	3,194	3,568	2,889
Week 7	2825\|2959	3,285	3,418	2,893
Week 8	2857\|3095	3,224	3,413	2,990
Week 9	2858\|3071	3,283	3,382	2,961
Week 10	2882\|3118	3,352	3,213	2,986
Week 11	2785\|3089	3,389	3,354	2,941
Week 12	2871\|3041	3,307	3,350	2,929
Week 13	2858\|3092	3,274	3,418	2,974
Week 14	2784\|2988	3,254	3,451	2,923
Week 15	2828\|3259	3,460	3,378	3,030
Week 16	2965\|3247	3,513	3,485	3,069
Week 17	2840\|3276	3,477	3,497	3,036
Week 18	2963\|3369	3,505	3,681	3,093
Week 19	3108\|3370	3,733	3,799	3,207
Week 20	3091\|3362	3,769	3,660	3,201
Week 21	3173\|3517	3,796	3,775	3,307
Week 22	3199\|3382	3,877	3,919	3,285
Week 23	3263\|3567	3,656	4,039	3,372
Week 24	3130\|3494	3,574	4,139	3,338
Week 25	3232\|3458	3,778	4,006	3,340
Week 26	3310\|3466		3,915	3,379
Week 27	3375\|3545		4,119	3,460
Week 28	3214\|3598		4,126	3,417
Week 29	3376\|3700		4,152	3,539
Week 30	3467\|3670		4,165	3,566
Week 31	3287\|3749		4,213	3,463
Week 32	3209\|3734		4,126	3,465
Week 33	3375\|3673		3,934	3,499
Week 34	3354\|3668		3,890	3,491
Week 35	3443\|3843		3,731	3,557
Week 36	3313\|3621		3,780	3,463
Week 37	3111\|3697		3,698	3,417
Week 38	3152\|3603		3,684	3,364
Week 39	3100\|3530		3,417	3,278
Week 40	3137\|3405		3,504	3,268
Week 41	3155\|3359		3,465	3,215
Week 42	3075\|3359		3,542	3,168
Week 43	2971\|3335		3,315	3,110
Week 44	3015\|3309		3,390	3,110
Week 45	2870\|3186		3,502	3,007
Week 46	2903\|3340		3,449	3,056
Week 47	2896\|3262		3,498	3,032
Week 48	2882\|3259		3,439	3,022
Week 49	2921\|3195		3,599	3,010
Week 50	2975\|3275		3,543	3,058
Week 51	2914\|3390		3,590	3,047
Week 52	2775\|3231		3,443	2,958

All deaths, Australia, 3 January 2022 - 25 June 2023 vs baseline benchmarks

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Data is by occurrence.
Data is provisional and subject to change.
Weeks are defined as seven-day periods which start on a Monday as per the ISO week date system. Refer to 'Weekly comparisons' on the methodology page of this publication for more information regarding the data in this graph. Week 1 ended 9 Jan 2022 and 8 Jan 2023.
The baseline includes deaths from 2017-19 and 2021.

Mortality by selected causes of death

Cause-specific mortality

The following analysis is based only on doctor certified deaths (i.e. coroner referred deaths are not included). Any changes in patterns of coroner referral could affect counts of doctor certified deaths. Some conditions have higher coroner referral rates (ischaemic heart disease, cerebrovascular diseases and to a lesser extent, respiratory diseases and diabetes) so counts for those conditions would be more likely to be affected by such changes.

COVID-19

In June 2023 there were 565 deaths due to COVID-19 that were certified by a doctor. This is 33.7% lower than the 852 deaths in June 2022 and 5.5% lower than the 598 deaths in May 2023.
There have been 2,742 deaths due to COVID-19 certified by a doctor between January and June 2023. This is 49.1% lower than the 5,389 deaths recorded in the same period in 2022.
As the pandemic has progressed the number of people dying 'with' COVID-19 has increased. In June 192 people died with COVID-19 as a contributing factor to their death (ie. COVID-19 was certified on the death certificate but it was not the underlying cause of death).

Other causes of death

Deaths due to dementia including Alzheimer's disease were 12.6% above the baseline average in June 2023, but 9.6% below June 2022.
Deaths due to ischaemic heart disease were 11.2% below the baseline average in June 2023 and 13.8% lower than June 2022.
Deaths due to cerebrovascular disease were 11.4% below than the baseline average in June 2023 and 12.3% lower than June 2022.

Doctor certified deaths by cause, 2023, 2022, Baseline
			June			Year to date - January - June
			2023	2022	baseline average	2023	2022	baseline average
Cancer			4,214	4,206	3,952	25,275	25,034	23,525
Dementia			1,557	1,722	1,383	8,443	8,809	7,301
Respiratory diseases			1,306	1,496	1,277	6,580	6,583	6,307
	Chronic lower respiratory diseases		711	741	680	3,632	3,636	3,520
	Influenza and pneumonia		260	390	274	1,183	1,217	1,187
		Pneumonia	199	238	232	1,035	1,016	1,062
Ischaemic heart disease			1,171	1,358	1,318	6,557	7,298	7,000
Other cardiac conditions			904	950	811	4,832	4,830	4,201
Cerebrovascular diseases			751	856	848	4,421	4,604	4,635
COVID-19			565	852	na	2,742	5,389	na
Diabetes			437	504	418	2,619	2,712	2,249

a. Only doctor certified deaths are included.
b. Data is by date of occurrence.
c. The baseline includes deaths from 2017-19 and 2021

COVID-19 mortality

Of the 613,089 death registrations received by the ABS (both doctor and coroner certified) in Australia during the pandemic period, 19,874 (3.2%) are of people who have died from or with COVID-19. Tabulations listed below include COVID-19 deaths by year of occurrence, state or territory of registry and by age.

Deaths due to COVID-19 by year and month of occurrence (a)(b)(c)(d)(e)
Year of death occurrence	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec	Total
2020	0	0	23	79	12	3	145	473	146	16	8	1	906
2021	2	1	1	2	0	0	13	98	316	442	260	219	1,354
2022	1645	1034	425	716	929	888	1408	1128	447	254	454	950	10,278
2023	738	225	256	417	607	568	302	72	na	na	na	na	3,185

a. Includes COVID-19 death registrations only. Numbers will differ to disease surveillance systems.
b. Includes all COVID-19 deaths (both doctor and coroner certified) that occurred and were registered by 31 August 2023.
c. All deaths due to COVID-19 in this report have been coded to ICD-10 code U07.1 COVID-19, virus identified; U07.2 COVID-19, virus not identified as the underlying cause of death; or U10.9 Multisystem inflammatory syndrome associated with COVID-19.
d. Data is provisional and subject to change.
e. Refer to the methodology for more information regarding the data in this table.

COVID-19 registered deaths by age and sex (a)(b)(c)(d)(e)
Age (years)	Males	Females
0-19	13	9
20-29	16	13
30-39	43	28
40-49	93	56
50-59	275	160
60-69	702	410
70-79	1,919	1,070
80-89	3,386	2,546
90+	2,179	2,805

a. Includes COVID-19 death registrations only. Numbers will differ to disease surveillance systems.
b. Includes all COVID-19 deaths (both doctor and coroner certified) that occurred and were registered by 31 August 2023.
c. Deaths due to COVID-19 in this report have an underlying cause of ICD-10 code U07.1 COVID-19, virus identified; U07.2 COVID-19, virus not identified as the underlying cause of death; or U10.9 Multisystem inflammatory syndrome associated with COVID-19.
d. Data is provisional and subject to change.
e. Refer to the methodology for more information regarding the data in this graph.

Number and proportion of COVID-19 deaths by state of registration (a)(b)(c)(d)(e)
	COVID-19 deaths (no.)	Proportion of total COVID-19 deaths (%)
NSW	5,607	35.7
Vic	5,224	33.2
Qld	2,272	14.5
SA	1,100	7.0
WA	947	6.0
Tas	300	1.9
NT	59	0.4
ACT	214	1.4
Aus	15,723	100.0

COVID-19 related deaths are where the deceased died with COVID-19 (and it was a significant factor), but it did not directly cause death. There have been 1,105 COVID-19 related deaths in 2023. In all months this year, the number of COVID-19 related deaths has been lower than in 2022.

COVID-19 related deaths by year and month of occurrence (a)(b)(c)(d)(e)
Year of death occurrence	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec	Total
2020	0	0	0	1	0	1	0	5	2	0	0	0	9
2021	0	0	0	0	0	0	1	1	3	15	19	25	64
2022	231	208	125	216	298	282	465	446	186	97	138	281	2,973
2023	225	103	122	142	186	192	91	44	na	na	na	na	1105

a. Includes COVID-19 death registrations only. Numbers will differ to disease surveillance systems.
b. Includes all COVID-19 deaths (both doctor and coroner certified) that occurred and were registered by 31 August 2023.
c. COVID-19 related deaths have an associated cause of either ICD-10 code U07.1 COVID-19, virus identified; U07.2 COVID-19, virus not identified; or U09 Post COVID-19 condition.
d. Data is provisional and subject to change.
e. Refer to the methodology for more information regarding the data in this graph.

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