Total UK deaths in 2020 and 2021

​FOI Reference: FOI/2022/4256

You asked

I would like to submit a FOI request for the total death rates in the whole of the UK to include in one overall total for all groups. The same separately for 2020 and 2021. Regardless of Covid etc. For example, the same data you would ordinarily release yearly-prior to Covid.

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.

In collaboration with these organisations, we publish headline data for the UK in our Vital statistics in the UK: births, deaths and marriages - Office for National Statistics (ons.gov.uk) publication. This is published at the end of each year with data supplied by NISRA and NRS. The latest data available is 2020, with data for 2021 due to be released in December 2022.

For deaths in England and Wales for 2021, please see the following publication: Deaths Registered Series. Deaths for the past 5 years for context against the 2020 and 2021 data has been extracted into the below table. Data is available from 1838.

Number of deaths, crude, and age-standardised-mortality rates (ASMRs) by sex, registered 1838 to 2021

Should you wish to obtain Scottish and Northern Irish mortality data for 2021 prior to the release of the UK figures in December 2022, we recommend contacting NRS and NISRA. They can be contacted at foi@nrscotland.gov.uk and info@nisra.gov.uk respectively.

For further information about England and Wales, please contact Health.data@ons.gov.uk.