Suicides, heart attacks and accidental falls, among the increasing causes of death in Malaga

Statistics just published show the reasons for the death rate to have increased so much in 2021. The most evident is Covid, which ended the lives or contributed to the deaths of 1,410 people in Malaga, but illnesses of the circulatory system were the main cause, accounting for 4,282 fatalities.

These were already the main cause of death in 2020, but the number rose by 3.9% in a year and by 11.7% compared with 2019.

Cancer is the second cause of death among people in Malaga and fatalities did increase in 2021 but not as intensively. A total of 3,551 people died from the illness last year, which was 2.9% more than in 2020 and 5.4% more than in 2019.

On the other hand, there was a substantial reduction in deaths associated with respiratory illnesses which were not Covid last year, from 1,237 in 2019 and 1,108 in 2020 to 1,000 in 2021. Experts say this is due to the fact that people were wearing masks so respiratory viruses were unable to spread as much as previously.

Last year only two people died from flu in the province, compared with 29 in 2020 and 28 in 2019. The number of deaths from pneumonia not associated with coronavirus also dropped by 28% last year compared with 2020 and by 36.4% compared with 2019.

Deaths from unnatural causes, from suicide to murders, took the lives of 536 people in Malaga last year, 7.4% more than in 2020. This could be due to the effects of lockdowns and mobility restrictions (which reduced the number of deaths in traffic accidents), but another statistic casts doubt on this theory because the number of unnatural deaths also increased (by 20.2%) compared with 2019.

With regard to suicide, 187 people took their own life in Malaga last year, which was 14.7% more than in 2020 and 53.3% more than in 2019.

Other unnatural deaths include accidental falls (130 in Malaga last year), traffic accidents (49), drownings (64), drug overdose (33) and homicides (15).

The number of deaths associated with Alzheimer’s was similar to previous years, with 541 in the province. There were also 511 age-related deaths from other illnesses of this type which were not Alzheimer’s.