The trend and pattern of adult mortality in South-Central Ethiopia: analysis using the 2008-2019 data from Butajira Health and Demographic Surveillance System

BACKGROUND: Understanding context-specific temporal trends in mortality is essential for setting health policy priorities. OBJECTIVE: To investigate the trends and distribution of deaths due to communicable and non-communicable diseases and external causes in South-Central Ethiopia. METHOD: All adult deaths captured by the Butajira Health and Demographic Surveillance System between January 2008 and December 2019 were included. A verbal autopsy method of collecting cause of death data was used. Physician review and a computerised algorithm, InterVA, were used to determine the cause of death. Coding was undertaken using the World Health Organization's International Classification of Diseases. Trends in adult mortality rate and proportional mortality were estimated by major cause of death categories. Significant trends were analysed using the Mann–Kendall statistical test with a significance set at P < 0.05. Deaths were also disaggregated by age, sex, and residence. RESULTS: There were 1,612 deaths in 279,681 person-years; 811 (50.3%) were females. The median age at death was 65 years. The proportional adult mortality and adult mortality rates (per 1000 person-years) attributed to communicable diseases, non-communicable diseases, and external causes were 31.1%, 58.9%, and 6.0%, and 1.9, 3.4, and 0.4, respectively. Adult mortality due to communicable diseases showed a declining trend (tau, the measure of the strength and direction of association, = −0.52; P < 0.05), whereas the trend increased for non-communicable diseases (tau = 0.67, P < 0.05) and external causes (tau = 0.29, P > 0.05). Moreover, death rates were pronounced in the 65+ age group and rural areas but comparable among males and females. CONCLUSION: The trend in deaths due to communicable diseases declined but increased for non-communicable diseases and external causes with significant public health burdens. These findings will provide essential input in formulating health policy reforms to reduce premature mortality.