South Africa vs United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland: Causes of mortality

South Africa
487,682 Deaths
in 2020
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
647,699 Deaths
in 2024
South Africa rank
10th
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland rank
8th

Causes of mortality over time

  • South Africa
  • United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
200.0k300.0k400.0k500.0k600.0k700.0k196019922024

How they compare

United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland currently reports 647,699 Deaths against 487,682 Deaths in South Africa, a difference of 160,017 Deaths.

That makes United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland's figure about 1.3 times South Africa's.

The two have swapped places 2 times across 27 shared years of data; in 1993 it was United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland ahead.

South Africa ranks 10th and United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland ranks 8th of 36 countries.

United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland has averaged higher in every one of the 4 decades both report.

Head to head by decade

Decade South Africa United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland Difference Ahead
1990s 308,060 Deaths 636,942 Deaths 328,883 Deaths United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
2000s 558,198 Deaths 586,500 Deaths 28,302 Deaths United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
2010s 475,084 Deaths 585,386 Deaths 110,303 Deaths United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
2020s 487,682 Deaths 688,806 Deaths 201,124 Deaths United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland

Averages of every year both report within each decade.

Frequently asked questions

Which has higher causes of mortality, South Africa or United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland?
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, at 647,699 Deaths against 487,682 Deaths in South Africa as of 2024.
What is the difference in causes of mortality between South Africa and United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland?
160,017 Deaths, with United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland ahead.
How many years of comparable data are there for South Africa and United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland?
27 years are reported by both, from 1993 to 2020.
How do South Africa and United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland rank globally for causes of mortality?
South Africa ranks 10th and United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland ranks 8th of 36 countries.
Where does this data come from?
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, published as Causes of mortality. Statizoid refreshes it automatically from the source and publishes the full history for both places.

Individual pages

Share, cite or embed this page

Cite this page

South Africa vs United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland: Causes of mortality. Statizoid, drawing on Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. Retrieved 06 September 2026, from https://health.statizoid.com/compare/causes-of-mortality/south-africa/united-kingdom/

Embed or link this data

Paste this into a page to link back to these figures. The data itself is free to reuse under OECD Terms and Conditions (attribution required); please keep the attribution.

<a href="https://health.statizoid.com/compare/causes-of-mortality/south-africa/united-kingdom/">South Africa vs United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland: Causes of mortality</a> — Statizoid

About this data

Indicator
Causes of mortality
Unit
Deaths
Source
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
Licence
OECD Terms and Conditions (attribution required)
Coverage
46 places, 2,503 data points, 1960–2024
Last refreshed

This dataset presents the number of deaths and age-standardised death rates by causes of deaths. The number of deaths according to sex and selected causes are extracted from the World Health Organization Mortality Database available at https://www.who.int/data/data-collection-tools/who-mortality-database. Detailed information on the coverage and reliability of the cause-of-death data is regularly published in World Health Statistics Annuals. The selected causes of death presented in the OECD Health Statistics database are detailed in an Excel file available for download, with codes according to the Tenth revision of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD) along with codes from other ICD revisions used in the WHO Mortality Database. Please refer to the Sources and Methods for detailed country-specific information.