FOI Ref: FOI/2021/3310
You asked
Please supply a breakdown of COVID-19 deaths in all children under 18 since March 2020 and the number of children who died from influenza in the same period March 2020 to Dec 2021.
We said
Thank you for your enquiry regarding COVID-19 and influenza deaths in children in England and Wales in 2020 and 2021.
2020 data
The information you have requested part of our explorable dataset available on our NOMIS webservice.
Our mortality data comes from the information collected at death registration. All of the conditions mentioned on the death certificate are coded using the International Classification of Diseases, Tenth Revision (ICD-10). From all of these causes an underlying cause of death is selected using ICD-10 coding rules.
The underlying cause of death is defined by WHO as:
a) the disease or injury that initiated the train of events directly leading to death, or b) the circumstances of the accident or violence that produced the fatal injury
The ICD-10 cause code for influenza is J09- J11 and for COVID-19 U07.1 and U07.2.
- Select the geography (England and Wales, regional or by local authority).
- Select Age -- All ages or 5-year age bands.
- Select Gender -- Total or Male/Female
- Select rates -- All deaths, rates or percentage of population for example.
- Select cause of death (ICD10 code search is available).
- Select format (Excel or CSV for example)
| Age | A00-R99,U00-Y89 All causes, all ages | J09-J11 Influenza | U07.1 COVID-19, virus identified | U07.2 COVID-19, virus not identified |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| total (all ages) | 607,922 | 511 | 69,762 | 4,004 |
| Aged under 1 | 2,381 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Aged 1 to 4 | 325 | 6 | 0 | 0 |
| Aged 5 to 9 | 218 | 7 | 1 | 0 |
| Aged 10-14 | 283 | 1 | 4 | 0 |
| Aged 15-19 | 673 | 2 | 10 | 0 |
Download this table Table 1 showing deaths in 2020
.xls .csvCOVID-19 deaths are also published monthly by single year of age in the following publication for 2020 and 2021. Single year of age and average age of death of people whose death was due to or involved COVID-19 - Office for National Statistics (ons.gov.uk)
Please find Table 2 attached: Number of deaths by single year of age, cause, and month of death registration, deaths registered in March 2020 to December 2020, England and Wales(PDF, 100kB).
2021 COVID deaths
We hold the following analysis by age for COVID-19 deaths: Single year of age and average age of death of people whose death was due to or involved COVID-19 - Office for National Statistics (ons.gov.uk).
Please find Table 3 attached: Number of deaths by single year of age, cause, and month of death registration, deaths registered in January 2021 to October 2021, England and Wales(PDF, 70kB).
2021 influenza deaths
Unfortunately, we do not hold analysis of influenza only statistics by age. In our provisional publication Deaths Registered weekly in England and Wales we do publish these statistics, but with no age breakdown.
If this does not meet your needs, we can create a custom output. Information on deaths by specific ICD-19 code and age disaggregation along with other 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 would fall outside of the Freedom of Information regime and should be made to: Health.Data@ons.gov.uk.
Downloads associated with request
- Number of deaths by single year of age, cause, and month of death registration, deaths registered in March 2020 to December 2020, England and Wales (101.0 kB pdf)
- Number of deaths by single year of age, cause, and month of death registration, deaths registered in January 2021 to October 2021, England and Wales (70.9 kB pdf)