The 10 leading causes of death in 2023

For the report, CDC analyzed U.S. death certificates and noted that the results are provisional. A final report from CDC is expected to come later this year after further analysis of the data.

Overall, there were 3.09 million deaths in the United States last year, down from 3.28 million in 2022. The leading cause of death in the United States last year was heart disease, followed by cancer, unintentional injuries, and stroke.

All causes of death saw drops from 2022 to 2023 except for cancer deaths, which rose from 608,371 in 2022 to 613,331 in 2023.

COVID-19 deaths saw a significant drop from 186,552 deaths in 2022 to 49,303 in 2023, representing the 10th-leading cause of death in 2023. According to CDC, COVID-19 deaths dropped last year for people of all ages and racial and ethnic groups, however those ages 85 and older still represented an outsized share of deaths.

While American Indian and Alaska Native people had the highest rates of COVID-19 deaths during the pandemic, white people saw the highest rate of deaths in 2023, the researchers found.

During the peak of the pandemic in 2020 and 2021, COVID-19 was the third-leading cause of death in the United States, but in the past two years, the top three causes of death have consistently been heart disease, cancer, and unintentional injuries.

According to CDC, the number of deaths from COVID-19 is still substantial and the virus continues to represent a threat, especially to older adults and people with underlying medical conditions. However, compared to the pandemic era, COVID-19 is significantly less likely to result in severe illness thanks to widespread immunity from vaccines and prior infections.

CDC noted that while COVID-19 immunity wanes, it still recommends most people get an updated COVID-19 vaccination when it becomes available this fall.

Discussion

While the report doesn't explain why deaths have decreased in the United States, John Brownstein, an epidemiologist and CIO at Boston Children's Hospital, said likely reasons include the prevention of COVID-19 deaths through vaccinations, treatments for early illness, and a better understanding of the virus.

"Being on the other side of the pandemic played a big part in seeing this overall mortality rate go down," he said. "This is, in large part, related to the public health effort, especially vaccines that, of course, saved so many lives."

Farida Ahmad, from CDC's Division of Vital Statistics at the National Center for Health Statistics and an author on the report, said the drop in COVID-19 deaths is "a pretty dramatic change," but noted that "it's not game-over for COVID" and that healthcare providers should still pay close attention to it.

"It's good news to see that COVID has dropped to tenth place ... but we should remember that it is still one of the leading causes," Ahmad said, noting the leading causes of death "are generally pretty stable."

Becky Smullin Dawson, from Allegheny College in Pennsylvania, noted the number of unintentional injuries, which she said is "a way of saying without saying a lot of people are dying of drug overdoses."

Dawson added that provisional data shows that "the pandemic effect on mortality appears to be over" and that the decrease in COVID-19 deaths is "a testament to the development of vaccines and treatments that effectively prevent and treat severe illness." (Bendix, NBC News, 8/8; McPhillips, CNN, 8/8; Kekatos, ABC News, 8/8; Robertson, MedPage Today, 8/8)

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