Recent mortality tracking pre-pandemic lows, says CMI

The Continuous Mortality Investigation (CMI) publishes frequent mortality analysis for England & Wales through its mortality monitors. Today’s updates cover week 26 of 2024 (to 28 June 2024) and the second quarter of 2024, based on provisional England & Wales deaths data published by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) on 10 July 2024.

The key points are:

• Mortality in the first half of 2024 was similar to the record-low mortality seen in the first half of 2019. This is a significant improvement compared to 2023, with cumulative mortality rates currently 3.4% lower.
• All age groups have seen lower mortality in the first half of 2024 than in the first half of 2023.
• Mortality compared to the 2014-2023 average varies by age. Mortality for ages 20-44 is 1.1% above the ten-year average while mortality for ages 75-84 is 4.4% below it.
• There were around 5,200 deaths involving COVID-19 registered in the first half of 2024, compared to around 11,700 in the first half of 2023 and 20,700 in the first half of 2022.
• Average mortality over the last twelve months is close to the record low, with only periods including 2019 having had lower annual average mortality.

Cobus Daneel, Chair of the CMI Mortality Projections Committee, said: “During the peak of the pandemic, we saw periods of high and volatile mortality. However, over the past five quarters, we have seen mortality rates close to all-time lows and following typical seasonal patterns.

"The overall mortality rate is dominated by older ages, which are experiencing low mortality. In contrast, mortality in the working-age population is still higher than pre-pandemic lows.

"It remains to be seen what the remainder of 2024 will bring – 2014, 2019 and 2022 all had similar mortality to 2024 in the first half of the year, but very different experience in the second half.”

All mortality monitor weekly updates are publicly available on the mortality monitor page.