Notes on the data: Premature mortality by sex - 0 to 74 years

Total deaths, persons aged 0 to 74 years, 2017 to 2021

Policy context: Deaths before 75 years of age can be classified as ‘premature’. The upper age limit of 74 years reflects current life expectancy of around 78 years for males and 84 year for females in OECD countries [1]. It also reflects a decision to set a limit in the analysis to reduce the proportion of the population who will have moved to an area with a different level of socioeconomic disadvantage to that in which they lived over their lifetime: this is an important consideration for these data when viewed for small geographic areas. Australians who were born during the period 2020 to 2022 had a life expectancy of 81.2 years for males and 85.3 years for females, while at 75 years of age they could expect to live an average of an additional 12.6 years (males) or 14.4 years (females) [2].

Some 34.0% of deaths over the years 2017 to 2021 occurred before 75 years of age, although the proportion varies by sex and by cause, as shown here. Malignant neoplasms (cancer), the combined external causes of accidents, poisonings and violence, and diseases of the respiratory and circulatory systems were the main causes of premature death for Australians in this period. Persons most likely to die prematurely include Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, single mothers, those earning low incomes, and those who were unemployed [3].

References

OECD Data, Life Expectancy at birth. Available from: https://data.oecd.org/healthstat/life-expectancy-at-birth.htm.
Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). Life Tables, 2018-2020. Available from:https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/people/population/life-tables/latest-release: last accessed 23 March 2022.
Glover J, Harris K, Tennant S. A social health atlas of Australia [second edition] - volume 1: Australia. Adelaide: PHIDU, The University of Adelaide; 1999.

Notes: For deaths data released since 2007, the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) has applied a staged approach to the coding of cause of death which affects the number of records available for release at any date. In general, the latest year’s data is preliminary, the second latest is revised and the data for the remaining years is final. For further information about the ABS revisions process see the following and related sites: http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/Lookup/3303.0Explanatory+Notes12012.

Data published here are from the following releases: 2017, final; 2018, revised; and 2019, 2020, and 2021, preliminary. Some causes of death, including drug-induced deaths, suicide and assault, are more sensitive to the revisions process than others: as a result, data in the files designated as preliminary should be treated with caution.

Geography: Data available by Population Health Area, Local Government Area, Primary Health Network, Quintile of socioeconomic disadvantage of area and Quintiles within PHNs, and Remoteness Area

Numerator: All deaths of people aged 0 to 74 years

Denominator: Population aged 0 to 74 years

Detail of analysis: Average annual indirectly age-standardised rate per 100,000 population (aged 0 to 74 years); and/or indirectly age-standardised ratio, based on the Australian standard.

Source: Data compiled by PHIDU from deaths data based on the 2017 to 2021 Cause of Death Unit Record Files supplied by the Australian Coordinating Registry and the Victorian Department of Justice, on behalf of the Registries of Births, Deaths and Marriages and the National Coronial Information System. The population is the average of the ABS Estimated Resident Population (ERP) for Australia, 30 June 2017 to 30 June 2021.