FOI Reference: FOI/2021/3393
You asked
Please can you tell me how many deaths in total there has been in under 60-year-olds with zero co-morbidities from March 2020 until December 2021?
Please advise if obesity is considered a co-morbidity?
We said
Thank you for your request.
We are responsible for the production of mortality data for England and Wales, this is derived from death certificates in the process of death registration.
For mortality figures where COVID-19 was the sole cause of death, please see: Pre-existing conditions of people whose death was recorded with an underlying cause of COVID-19. This dataset can be found in section 8 of the Monthly mortality analysis bulletin. This dataset provides a greater insight into the leading pre-existing cause of death groups, for deaths occurring in England and Wales, in 2020 and the first three quarters of 2021 that were due to COVID-19.
Please see 'table 1a, row 28' (2020) and 'table 1, row 29 (2021)' for deaths where COVID-19 was listed as the underlying cause, but had no other pre-existing conditions recorded on the death certificate, England and Wales. Table 1b represents these figures for England and table 1c figures are for Wales. We have also pasted this information in this response. This shows death registrations for 2020 and 2021 (provisional) that were due to COVID-19 and were recorded without any pre-existing conditions, England and Wales, aged 0-64 and 65 and over:
2020: 9400 (0-64: 1549 / 65 and over: 7851)
2021 Q1: 6483 (0-64: 1560/ 65 and over: 4923)
2021 Q2: 346 (0-64: 153/ 65 and over: 193)
2021 Q3: 1142 (0-64: 512/ 65 and over: 630)
COVID-19 deaths and obesity
Obesity can be considered a cause of death but is more commonly a secondary factor that contributes to a death. Figures for deaths due to COVID-19 where obesity was included as a pre-existing condition are held within our COVID-19 pre-existing conditions dataset.
2020: 985 (0-64: 562/ 65 and over: 423) (Row 27)
2021 Q1: 1071 (0-64: 648/ 65 and over: 423) (Row 21)
2021 Q2: 80 (0-64: 53/ 65 and over: 27) (Row 18)
2021 Q3: 231 (0-64: 160/ 65 and over: 71) (Row 20)
We have not yet finalised analysis on COVID-19 deaths by pre-existing condition for 2021 Q4. This is currently scheduled for release on 23 February 2022. This publication will be updated quarterly going forward.
This analysis, COVID-19 deaths involving pre-existing conditions, is split by broad age groups between 1-64 and 65+. We have not produced this analysis with an age split for under 60 years old specifically. However, we can produce this for you as a bespoke request. Special extracts and tabulations of mortality data for England and Wales are available to order (subject to legal frameworks, disclosure control, resources and agreements of costs, where appropriate). Such enquiries fall outside of the Freedom of Information regime and can be made to: Health.Data@ons.gov.uk.
If you would like to discuss this query further, please feel free to contact health.data@ons.gov.uk.