FOI Ref: FOI/2022/4200
You asked
I would like to request a number of statistics relating to Death, Serious Injury and Life Changing Injury in the following areas, relating to the years 2020 and 2021:
All statistics and areas are required for The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland only.
Rivers and Canals
Inshore Waters
Flooding
Derelict and unused buildings
Unsafe structures
Used buildings
Caves
Building sites
Mountainous Regions
Forests and Wooded areas
Coastal Areas
Canyons and Valleys
Confined Spaces
Or involving;
Large machinery
Inshore recreational boats, canoes or water activities Abseiling Rock climbing Hiking Mountaineering Mountain Biking Cave Exploration Camping or exploration Misadventure Working in unsafe environments Weather related Natural Disaster.
In relation to my request, could you please include the years 2018 and 2019 across all aspects.
We said
Thank you for your enquiry,
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. National Records Scotland (NRS) and Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (NISRA) are responsible for statistics pertaining to Scotland and Northern Ireland. They can be contacted at foi@nrscotland.gov.uk and info@nisra.gov.uk respectively.
ONS do not hold information on serious and life changing injuries.
Statistics on accidents in a working environment can be obtained from the Health and Safety Executive.
Statistics on accidents involving water can be found at the National Water Safety forum.
Our mortality data is taken from the information provided on death certificates. The death certificate used in England and Wales is compatible with that recommended by World Health Organisation. It is set out in two parts. Part I gives the condition or sequence of conditions leading directly to death, while Part II gives details of any associated conditions that contributed to the death but are not part of the causal sequence.
When we receive the data, we use computer algorithms to apply rules which increase the consistency and improve the international and temporal comparability of mortality statistics. Therefore, we can only report on what is recorded on the death certificate during this process.
Unfortunately, the data we receive from the death certificate does not always provide information on the place of the death or where the accident occurred in is as much detail as you require.
More information about the information included on the death certificate and our death registration process can be found in our mortality statistics user guide, accessible via the following link: User Guide to Mortality Statistics.
Data for deaths registered up to December 2020 is available in our 21st Century Mortality publication or the NOMIS online query tool. Using ICD10 Version 2016 codes listed in the WHO International classification for diseases Chapter XX, you can extract data for deaths that have involved:
Falls
Drowning
Exposure to mechanical forces
Extreme hot or cold weather
Boating accidents
Building collapse
Confined/Trapped in a low oxygen environment
Alternatively, we can offer you a bespoke tabulation of the above. It is possible perform a search of the coroner text to look for the terms laid out in your query, but we would not advise this as the results are likely to be a large under representation as we cannot guarantee that the location information would be recorded.
These bespoke data requests are outside of the FOI framework and are available to order from the HALE Customer services team and are subject to disclosure control, legal frameworks, resources and subject to agreement to costs, where applicable. Please contact Health.Data@ons.gov.uk to access this service.