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Tag Archives: Mortality

Mortality declines in Aotearoa NZ during the first two years of the Covid-19 pandemic

Wednesday, February 23rd, 2022 | carra86p | 6 Comments

Dr Jennifer Summers, Professor Michael Baker, Professor Nick Wilson*

In this blog we review the impact of Aotearoa NZ’s Covid-19 response strategies on mortality patterns during the first 2 years of the pandemic. We find that NZ experienced an increase in life expectancy, decreased winter mortality, and net decline in (excess) mortality. These impacts are far more positive than experienced by all other high-income countries during this pandemic period. This picture supports the cautious elimination and suppression strategies used for the first 2 years of the pandemic and there has also been time to prepare the country for the current Omicron wave.  

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Weekly deaths declined in NZ’s lockdown – but we still don’t know exactly why

Friday, July 10th, 2020 | tedla55p | 6 Comments

Prof Nick Wilson, Dr Anja Mizdrak, Dr Jennifer Summers, Prof Michael Baker

The pandemic-related lockdown is possibly the most dramatic public health intervention in NZ history. It helped achieve the elimination of community transmission of the COVID-19 virus in NZ. But it was also associated with 548 fewer total deaths than for the same period in 2019. Death rates (per 100,000 population) were also lower in 2020 than the three preceding years. There are a range of plausible reasons for this reduction (eg, fewer road crashes, fewer circulating respiratory infections) but we still need precise cause of death data (available in the future) to make more informed assessments.

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Ethnic inequalities in mortality in NZ and how to reduce them further

Monday, May 29th, 2017 | Kate Sloane | No Comments

Dr George Disney, Dr Andrea Teng, June Atkinson, Frederieke Sanne van der Deen, Prof Nick Wilson, Prof Tony Blakely 

In a study we just published, we found that whilst there have been declines in all-cause mortality rates, over time, for Māori, Pacific peoples and the European/Other ethnic group, there are still striking mortality gaps that need to be addressed. Ethnic mortality inequalities are generally stable or even falling in absolute terms, but have increased on a relative scale. To further address these inequalities, NZ policy-makers have many options, ranging from equalising socio-economic factors between ethnic groups, improving access to health services, tobacco control and addressing the obesogenic environment.

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A 100 years ago: The worst year of the First World War for New Zealand

Monday, May 1st, 2017 | hensa32p | No Comments

Professor Nick Wilson, University of Otago; Professor Glyn Harper, Massey University

The year 1917 was the worst year of the First World War for New Zealand from a premature mortality perspective, with 5547 deaths. We have just presented on this topic at a Symposium at Te Papa (Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa) and in this blog we summarise the mortality patterns we described. We also consider to what extent some of these deaths may have been preventable with knowledge available at the time. Continue reading →

Introducing an Online Data Explorer Tool: 30 years of NZ mortality and cancer data

Wednesday, May 25th, 2016 | Kate Sloane | No Comments

Dr George Disney, Dr Andrea Teng, Prof Nick Wilson, Prof Tony Blakely

Data Explorer blogThere are striking inequalities in cancer incidence and mortality in NZ, by both ethnicity and socioeconomic status. In this blog, we introduce an interactive online tool that enables anyone from researchers, policy-makers, journalists and health practitioners to access high quality data on these vital, population-level health statistics. Examples we use include: massive declines in cardiovascular disease inequality, but still large inequalities such as widening gaps in mortality for diseases consistent with the obesity epidemic; and the fact that adults aged 25-44 years with no formal qualifications have had very little mortality decline in the last 30 years, begging the question “Why?”.

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