国际英语资讯:Dementia biggest cause of death in Britain for first time_时事

国际英语资讯:Dementia biggest cause of death in Britain for first time

LONDON, Nov. 14 -- Dementia and Alzheimer's disease have, for the first time, replaced heart disease as the leading cause of death in England and Wales, due to more women dying from the disease, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said Monday.

New figures from ONS show that 61,686 people died of dementia or Alzheimer's last year, accounting for 11.6 percent of all deaths.

Around 20,000 men died from dementia and Alzheimer's, while the disease accounted for the deaths of more than 40,000 women, statistics from ONS revealed.

ONS said the age-standardised mortality rate for dementia and Alzheimer's had more than doubled over the last five years for both men and women.

国际英语资讯:Dementia biggest cause of death in Britain for first time1

"The majority of these deaths were among females, while heart disease remains the leading cause of death amongst men," added ONS.

Elizabeth McLaren, head of Life Event Statistics at the ONS, said: "In 2017, dementia and Alzheimer's disease became the leading cause of death in part because people are simply living longer but also because of improved detection and diagnosis."

Another factor for the increase was that international rules for determining the underlying cause of death had been updated, as well as there being an "increase in cases attributed to these conditions accompanied by falls in other causes."

The ONS statistics show the leading cause of death varied widely by age group, with people over 80 years old accounting for the majority of dementia and Alzheimer's deaths.