Vital records document the birth, death, marriage and divorce of every individual. A more centralized system in the US could help public health researchers better study pandemics and disease.
The cause of every death in Australia must be certified by a medical practitioner. If the cause of death is not clear, the death is reported to the state or territory coroner for investigation.
In the 19th century, ‘old age’ was once a leading cause of death, alongside the vague description ‘found dead’.
A November 2020 memorial in Washington, D.C. consisted of thousands of flags, each planted to remember someone who died of COVID-19.
Andrew Lichtenstein/Corbis via Getty Images
Record-keepers have a pretty good sense of how many people have died. But figuring out the cause of those deaths is a lot trickier – and that’s why reasonable modelers can disagree.
Important information about death can be collected from a person’s surviving relatives.
REUTERS/Mohamed Abd El-Ghany
In Africa, only four countries record more than 75% of their births and deaths. This creates an unequal system and impacts on how governments plan for these citizens.
One of the biggest problems in international development is that health statistics are badly kept in many of the countries with the most to gain. Finally something is being done about it.