Death registration summary statistics, England and Wales: 2024

• In 2024, there were 568,613 deaths registered in England and Wales; this was 12,750 (2.2%) fewer deaths than in 2023, and 8,547 (1.5%) fewer deaths than 2022.

• In England, 531,954 deaths were registered in 2024, which was 12,100 (2.2%) fewer deaths than 2023 and 8,379 (1.6%) fewer than 2022.

• In Wales, 35,404 deaths were registered, this was 650 (1.8%) fewer deaths than 2023 and 290 (0.8%) fewer than 2022.

• There were more male deaths registered (289,726 deaths) than female (278,887 deaths) in 2024, continuing the trend seen in recent years.

• Deaths were lower in every English region in 2024 compared with 2023; the region with the largest decrease was the North East (3.2% lower) and the region with the smallest was Yorkshire and The Humber (0.9% lower).

Coronaviruses

The World Health Organization (WHO) defines coronaviruses as "a large family of viruses that are known to cause illness ranging from the common cold to more severe diseases such as Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS)". Between 2001 and 2018, there were 12 deaths in England and Wales due to a coronavirus infection, with a further 13 deaths mentioning the virus as a contributory factor on the death certificate.

Coronavirus (COVID-19)

COVID-19 refers to the "coronavirus disease 2019" and is a disease that can affect the lungs and airways. It is caused by a type of coronavirus. Further information is available from the World Health Organization (WHO) Coronavirus disease article.

Registration delay

Mortality statistics for a given time period can be based on occurrence (death date) or registration (registration date); registration delay is the difference between date of occurrence and date of registration.

Figures in this release only represent deaths that were registered in England and Wales. These include some deaths of individuals whose usual residence was outside England and Wales (1,255 of the 568,613 deaths registered in 2024, the same as in 2023). These deaths are included in totals for England and Wales combined but excluded from breakdowns for England and Wales separately. Any deaths of residents that happened abroad are not included.

Death certification reform

Changes to the process by which causes of deaths are scrutinised and certified (Death certification reform and the introduction of medical examiners) came into force in England and Wales on 9 September 2024. This introduced a statutory medical examiner system, under which all non-coronial deaths must be independently scrutinised by a medical examiner before registration. The medical examiner is responsible for sending the medical certificate of cause of death (MCCD) to the registrar and notifying the informant when the death can be registered.

The reform also introduced a revised MCCD and a new medical examiner MCCD (ME MCCD) for use in specific circumstances. These changes are intended to improve the consistency and quality of death certification.

Further information is available in our Deaths registered weekly in England and Wales bulletin.

Registration delay

This bulletin is based on the date that deaths are registered, not the date of death (date of occurrence). The number of days between death occurrence and registration depends on many factors and there might be longer delays sometimes (for example, deaths referred to the coroner). Read more in our Impact of registration delays on mortality statistics in England and Wales: 2022 article.

Producing statistics based on date of death that are both timely and sufficiently complete is not possible. Statistics based on date of registration are both timely and complete, but it is important to consider the limitations of using registration data over occurrence data. Measures of the average gap (or delay) between the date of occurrence and date of registration are important statistical quality metrics to help users understand this.

Before 9 September 2024, deaths should legally have been registered within five days of the death occurring or the date on which the body was found (including weekends and bank holidays), unless a coroner was involved.

We continue to monitor registration delays as part of our ongoing assessments of the quality and timeliness of mortality data, including whether death certification reforms have affected registration delays.

Further detail is available in Table 4 of our Deaths registered weekly in England and Wales, provisional dataset.

Coding of deaths

Deaths are cause coded using the World Health Organization's (WHO) International Classification of Diseases, 10th edition (ICD-10). Deaths are coded to ICD-10 using IRIS software (version 2013). Cause of death reported here represents the final underlying cause of death for ages 28 days and over. This takes account of additional information received from medical practitioners or coroners after the death has been registered.

In 2011, there was an update to the coding framework (detailed in our Results of the ICD-10 v2010 bridge coding study) used to code cause of death. This meant that deaths from vascular dementia that were previously coded to cerebrovascular disease (I60 to I69) would be coded to vascular dementia (F01). There were further changes to the framework in 2014 (detailed in our Impact of the implementation of IRIS software for ICD-10 cause of death coding bulletin) where deaths that were coded to chest infection (J98) would now be coded to chest infection (J22). Those deaths that mentioned dementia (F01 or F03) would now be coded to dementia (F01 or F03). Additionally, deaths that were previously coded to aspiration pneumonia (I69) where dementia was mentioned on the death certificate would now be coded to dementia (F01 or F03).

For deaths registered from 1 January 2022, cause of death is coded to the ICD-10 classification using MUSE 5.8 software. Deaths registered between 1 January 2020 and 31 December 2021 were coded using MUSE 5.5 and previous years were coded to IRIS 4.2.3. For more information, see our Cause of death coding in mortality statistics, software changes article.

Strengths and limitations

Figures in this release are based on number of deaths, they are not provided to be comparable across groups or time. This is because population size and age structure has not been accounted for. This means we can provide the public with timely statistics, allowing our future releases to use finalised data (rather than provisional), increasing the efficiency of our statistics. Finalised deaths registration figures, including age-standardised mortality rates, will be released in our Deaths registered in England and Wales bulletin in summer 2025.

More quality and methodology information on strengths, limitations, appropriate uses, and how the data were created is available in our Mortality statistics in England and Wales quality and methodology information (QMI) report and our User guide to mortality statistics.

Accredited official statistics

These Accredited official statistics were independently reviewed by the Office for Statistics Regulation. They comply with the standards of trustworthiness, quality and value in the Code of Practice for Statistics and should be labelled "accredited official statistics".