Excess Deaths Still Stubbornly High in Australia 2023

We take a look at the latest Provisional Mortality Statistics released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics on the 28 June 2023, referencing January to March 2023 (link below). Unfortunately, excess deaths are still stubbornly high with 11.3% more deaths than one would expect based on historical averages.

Here is a graph of the baseline average deaths over the last five years, noting that 2022 has intentionally been excluded by the ABS due to the large number of excess deaths year-round as shown in orange, and therefore it is not indicative of a typical year for mortality in Australia. Similarly, 2020 has been excluded, except for the opposite reason. There were significantly less deaths than historical data would indicate.

If we look at deaths so far in 2023, we can see that there are significantly more deaths than one would expect. It’s not just by a small margin of error – it’s a lot! There are still significantly more deaths occurring this year than history would indicate. The number of deaths is well above the baseline range. It’s not some sort of anomaly of statistics. There are more people dying in Australia, and nobody seems to know why.

According to this report, it’s not COVID. In March 2023 there were 246 deaths due to COVID, which is 37.7% lower than the 395 deaths in March 2022. However, the same can’t be said for other causes of death.

Deaths due to dementia were 12.5% above the baseline average. With dementia largely affecting older people, more older people are dying than before the pandemic. It’s almost like we’ve failed at protecting our elderly folk, but for the wrong reasons.

Deaths due to other cardiac conditions were 19.8% above the baseline average! I’m not exactly sure what “other cardiac conditions” entails, but that’s a significant increase. One would think that with such a massive increase of almost 20%, the government would be racing to work out what’s going on, but no, as far as I can tell, these figures are just being quietly ignored.

Deaths due to respiratory diseases were 10.0% above baseline average, with influenza and pneumonia deaths being 17.1% above baseline! You’d think with everything we’ve learnt about respiratory illness over the last few years, we’d be better placed to deal with regular illnesses such as the flu. But no, we seem to be worse off than ever before.

Deaths due to cancer were also up at 8.3% above the baseline average.

Apparently ischaemic heart disease is down 3.9%, that is, heart disease typically caused by the build-up of plaque in the major arteries, remembering though that “other cardiac conditions” have significantly increased.

Similarly, deaths due to cerebrovascular disease, things like aneurysms and stroke, were 3.5% lower. These typically affect older people as well, so although less older people are dying from stroke, this is well and truly offset by the number of people dying from dementia.

Deaths due to diabetes were up a little bit at 3.2% above the baseline average in March, but don’t let that fool you. In the first quarter of 2023, diabetes deaths were 17.9% higher than the baseline average, which is actually 4.1% below the same period in 2022. There are so many more people dying from diabetes now.

Anyway, these are the raw numbers if you’re interested. I’m not going to go through them, but as usual, I’ve put a link to the data in the description below.

The point is, excess deaths are still stubbornly high so far in 2023. When will they come down? Will they come down? Perhaps this is the new normal.

ABC PROVISIONAL MORTALITY STATISTICS (Jan – Mar 2023)
https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/health/causes-death/provisional-mortality-statistics/jan-mar-2023

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