FOI reference: FOI-2025-2749
You asked
In 2018 the ONS released a report called Number of deaths from toxic effect of ingested plants, by underlying cause, England and Wales, deaths registered in 2016
Would it be possible to obtain a data set that records deaths in England and Wales from the toxic effect of ingested plants from the year 2000 to the present, that also identified the species of plant involved and the nature of the ingestion e.g. deliberate, accidental, unknown. Also the ages of the people involved and whether the plant toxicity was a primary or secondary cause of death.
We said
Thank you for your request.
The accompanying table provides you with the number of deaths where the toxic effect of ingested plants was mentioned on the death certificate, England and Wales, deaths registered between 2001 and 2023.
Our mortality statistics are derived from information collected at death registration. Deaths due to accidents and other external causes are certified by a coroner who determines the causes of death following an inquest, based on all the available evidence. It is unusual for wider contextual factors such as the name of a plant to be recorded on the death certificate, therefore we do not hold that information.
All of the conditions mentioned on the death certificate are coded using the International Classification of Diseases, Tenth Revision (ICD-10). From all of these causes an underlying cause of death is selected using ICD-10 coding rules.
The underlying cause of death is defined by WHO as:
a) the disease or injury that initiated the train of events directly leading to death, or
b) the circumstances of the accident or violence that produced the fatal injury
According to these rules, the ICD10 code T622 - Toxic effect of other ingested (parts of) plant(s), would not be allocated as an underlying cause, instead it is allocated as a secondary cause, secondary to a poisoning code. To identify the number of deaths where the toxic effect of plant ingestion was mentioned on the death certificate we must look firstly at where the death had an underlying cause of accidental (X49), intentional (X69) and undetermined (Y19) poisoning and a secondary cause of T622.
Deaths registered in 2000 were coded to the 9th version of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD9). We do not have these data readily available but they can be requested along with other special extracts and tabulations of mortality data for England and Wales, subject to legal frameworks, disclosure control, resources and agreements of costs. Please contact Health.Data@ons.gov.uk to discuss this further.