More than a million people died in Germany last year - almost four percent more than in the previous year. Tens of thousands of deaths can be attributed to Covid-19 alone. However, the most common cause of death is different.
Seven percent of all deaths in the past year can be directly attributed to Covid-19. A total of 1,023,687 people died in 2021, 3.9 percent more than in the previous year, according to the Federal Statistical Office in Wiesbaden. In 71,331 of them, Covid-19 was responsible as the underlying condition. The number of Covid 19 deaths rose by 79 percent compared to 2020.
Cases in which Covid-19 was documented as a concomitant disease on the death certificate during the post-mortem examination were not counted. As in previous years, the most common cause of death was cardiovascular disease. With 340,619 cases, a good third of all deaths were due to it. 45,181 people died from a heart attack.
The second leading cause of death was cancer. 22.4 percent of all deceased succumbed to such diseases. There were slightly fewer cases compared to the previous year.
In men, malignant neoplasms of the digestive organs and lung and bronchial cancer were the most frequently diagnosed cancers. Women were also most affected by cancers of the digestive organs, but the most common single diagnosis was breast cancer with 18,479 cases.
4.2 of all deaths were due to unnatural causes such as injuries or poisoning. 18,183 people died from falls. 9215 others committed suicide. 74 percent of those affected were men. Compared to the previous year, the number of suicides remained constant.
