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Death

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Roughly 57 million people die each year. That's about 1% of the total world population.

Causes of death

Deaths in 2002
Total 57,029,000 100.00%
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Cause of death Deaths Portion Graph
Intentional Suicide 873,000 1.53%
 
War 172,000 0.30%
 
Murder, violence, etc. 572,000 1.00%
 
Accidents Car accidents 1,192,000 2.09%
 
Drowning 382,000 0.67%
 
Falling 392,000 0.69%
 
Fires 312,000 0.55%
 
Poisoning (accidental) 350,000 0.61%
 
Other accidents 923,000 1.62%
 
Communicable diseases Tuberculosis 1,566,000 2.75%
 
AIDS 2,777,000 4.87%
 
Syphilis (and other STIs) 180,000 0.32%
 
Diarrheal diseases 1,798,000 3.15%
 
Measles and other childhood diseases 1,124,000 1.97%
 
Malaria 1,272,000 2.23%
 
Respiratory infections 3,963,000 6.95%
 
Other communicable diseases 2,187,000 3.83%
 
Pregnancy Unsafe abortion 77,000 0.14%
 
Other pregnancy related deaths (of mothers) 433,000 0.76%
 
Perinatal Perinatal deaths (of children) 2,462,000 4.32%
 
Nutrition Iron-deficiency and other nutritional 485,000 0.85%
 
Noncommunicable conditions Cancer (and neoplasms) 7,270,000 12.75%
 
Diabetes 988,000 1.73%
 
Alcoholism 91,000 0.16%
 
Drug use 86,000 0.15%
 
Heart disease (and cardiovascular) 16,733,000 29.34%
 
Asthma and respiratory diseases 3,702,000 6.49%
 
Digestive diseases 1,968,000 3.45%
 
Birth defects and congenital problems 493,000 0.86%
 
Other noncommunicable conditions 2,206,000 3.87%
 
source: WHO The World Health Report 2004

Interventions

Low hanging fruit -- "easily" preventable deaths
Solution Deaths
per Year
Portion
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Banning cigarettes (cancer, heart disease, etc.) [1] 5,000,000 8.77%
 
Routine immunizations for children [2] 2,200,000 3.86%
 
Treating complications of pregnancy [3] 510,000 0.89%
 
Birth control (deaths resulting from unwanted pregnancies) [4] 255,000 0.45%
 
Clean water for children (and treating diarrhea) [5] 1,400,000 2.45%
 
Food and health care for children under 5 [6] 9,200,000 16.13%
 
Condoms, antiretroviral drugs, etc. 2,777,000 4.87%
 
Big-picture solutions -- difficult to prevent deaths
Solution Deaths
per Year
Portion
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Halting global warming [7] 150,000 0.26%
 
Finding a cure for aging [8] 36,500,000 64.00%
 
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