These are the biggest killers in South Africa

The data, which reflects the reported and assessed causes of death for 2022, represents the tail-end of the Covid-19 pandemic.

As such, the impact of Covid-19 is less pronounced in the data, particularly when compared to the 2020 and 2021’s data where the virus accounted for up 15% of recorded deaths.

Taking wider view of the trend, 2022 represented a ‘normalisation’ of deaths in the country, where around 480,000 deaths were being recorded before the pandemic hit.

According to the data, a total of 486,041 deaths were recorded in 2022, down significantly from 620,394 recorded in 2021 and 515,891 in 2020.

When looking at the causes of death, the data is split into two categories: natural deaths and unnatural deaths, which are split further into their respective areas.

In 2022, South Africa recorded 421,466 natural deaths and 64,575 unnatural deaths. Notably, the number of unnatural deaths is a record high for the country.

Stats SA noted that when recording cause of death, there are sometimes more than one contributing factor, however this is in a minority of cases.

Most (53.6%) cases only have one cause of death, while about a quarter (23.3%) have two and 14.6% have three. On the vast minority side, 8% have four or more causes, and 0.5% have no cause listed.

Typically, a medical practitioner will determine the primary cause, which is described in a very general way, but then is split into more specific causes when considering them in context of the standardised Global Burden of Disease study.

This is an all-inclusive program of disease burden that assesses mortality and disability from major diseases, injuries, and risk factors.

It’s a standardised look at deaths that provides a comprehensive picture of mortality and disability across various metrics.

The biggest killers in South Africa

Looking at the biggest killers in South Africa, diabetes continues to be the biggest natural cause of death, with 32,863 deaths attributed to it in 2022 (6.8% of the total).

However, this is quickly being hounded by hypertension, which led to 31,230 deaths that year.

Cerebrovascular diseases, which present as a stroke, are third, followed by HIV. Other forms of heart disease are also prolific, while tuberculosis rounds out the top five.

Covid, which was attributed to over 130,000 deaths in 2020 and 2021 was not represented directly in the data.

The table below outlines the 10 biggest natural killers in the country.

Natural causes

Looking at the 64,575 unnatural deaths, these are largely attributed to “accidental” deaths, where 49,845 people died from “other external causes of accidental injury”.

However, this category is incredibly broad and doesn’t quite give the whole story.

In this category, “accidental exposure to other and unspecified factors” is the leading cause of unnatural death. This is the category that describes death as a result of an unknown or unspecified factor.

The second-biggest cause is “exposure to inanimate mechanical forces”. Crucially, this group includes discharge from other and unspecified firearms as well as contact with knife or sword.

The third most common cause was other accidental threats to breathing, which includes accidental hanging and strangulation.

So while the broader category positions these as “accidents”, the generalision belies the often violent causes of death being recorded.

The table below outlines the 10 biggest unnatural killers in the country.

Unnatural causes