FOI Ref: FOI/2021/3148
You asked
I've noticed that only 2021 and 2020 provide data for weekly deaths for those aged 15-19.
All previous years before 2020 only provide weekly deaths of those aged 15-44.
Please could you provide weekly provisional figures on deaths registered in England and Wales in 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2019 for the specific age group of 15-19.
If this data isn't available, could you provide some insight as to why before 2020, ages between 15-44 were only documented and in 2020 and 2021, they are broken up into: 15-19, 20-24, 25-29, 30-34, 35-39, 40-45.
We said
Thank you for your request.
We produce mortality data by five-year age group in the 2021 weekly deaths dataset, you can see deaths by age in the 'weekly figures 2021'. You can also find weekly figures by five-year age group in the 2020 edition of this dataset.
We do not hold analysis for deaths by five-year age group for ages 15-19 2015 to 2019 as you have requested. This information would need to be created as bespoke analysis. We may be able to produce this as a bespoke request for you. 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.
When COVID-19 became more prevalent in 2020, we began producing weekly deaths which included weekly deaths involving COVID-19 by five-year age group. It was a logical decision to produce weekly death by five-year age group as well. Before 2020, there was not as much of a requirement for a more granular age breakdown in the weekly deaths datasets.
We have also produced the following analysis, which may be of interest: Five year average weekly deaths by sex and age group, England and Wales: deaths occurring between 2015 and 2019. Please note, the weekly death figures in this dataset are based on the date the death occurred rather than the date the death was registered, so this is not directly comparable to the weekly deaths datasets.