FOI Ref: FOI/2022/3828
You asked
Please supply the following information:
The figure for all cause mortality for England and Wales for 2021.
The figure for all cause mortality for Northern Ireland for 2021.
We said
Thank you for your enquiry.
Northern Ireland data
We are responsible for the production of Mortality data for England and Wales, this is driven by information collected from the death certificate at death registration. Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (NISRA) are responsible for statistics pertaining to Northern Ireland. They can be contacted at info@nisra.gov.uk respectively.
We do publish headline data for the UK as part of a collaboration in our Vital Statistics in the UK publication. UK data for 2021 will be updated in December 2022.
England and Wales data
Deaths and rates for 2021 in England and Wales will be published in July 2022 as part of our Deaths Registered Series. This is to allow the inclusion of late registrations which are deaths which have been referred for Coroner Investigation and to use finalised mid-year population estimates.
As such, the information you have requested for England and Wales 2021 is considered exempt under Section 22(1) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000, whereby information is exempt from release if there is a view to publish the information in the future. Furthermore, as a central government department and producer of official statistics, we need to have the freedom to be able to determine our own publication timetables. This is to allow us to deal with the necessary preparation, administration, and context of publications. It would be unreasonable to consider disclosure when to do so would undermine our functions.
This exemption is subject to a public interest test. We recognise the desirability of information being freely available and this is considered by ONS when publication schedules are set in accordance with the Code of Practice for Statistics. The need for timely data must be balanced against the practicalities of applying statistical skill and judgement to produce the high quality, assured data needed to inform decision-making. If this balance is incorrectly applied, then we run the risk of decisions being based on inaccurate data which is arguably not in the public interest. This will have an impact on public trust in official statistics in a time when accuracy of official statistics is more important to the public than ever before.
You may find the following information useful:
Monthly deaths and ASMRs are available for 2021 as part of our Monthly Mortality Analysis publication. This is based on provisional data and is subject to change.