The Australian mortality decline: all-cause mortality 1788-1990

Abstract

This review describes the Australian decline in allcause mortality, , and compares this with declines in Europe and North America. The period until the 1870s shows characteristic 'crisis mortality', attributable to epidemics of infectious disease. A decline in overall mortality is evident from 1880.

Suicide and political regime in New South Wales and Australia during the 20th century

“…A similar method was used for the first and second world wars. The world war variables were modelled primarily to control for the artefactual drop in male suicide rates during the second world war when servicemen were not included in mortality data, 43 and for the real but unmeasured drops in suicide observed in civilian populations during both world wars. The availability of sedatives during 1960-1967 under the government subsidised Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, known to have affected Australian suicide rates (especially in women), 8 was also included as a variable.…”

The Australian epidemic of cardiovascular mortality 1935–2005: effects of period and birth cohort

“…The epidemic of CVD in Australia appeared to commence in the 1920s,2 3 although there are difficulties with coding and exclusion of RHD before 1935. CVD mortality, including both IHD and stroke, undergo a significant and sustained decline after 1970 1–3.…”

“…There is no evidence of birth cohort effects, such as may be consistent with hypotheses of perinatal influences, such as changes in birth weight. Direct evidence for presumed improvement in birth weight over the 20th century is lacking, and although the infant mortality rate has often been taken as a surrogate for maternal and fetal under-nutrition in ‘life course’ discourse,19 21 the sustained decline in the Australian infant mortality rate from 19042 would also have been attributable to the control of infectious disease from improvements in environmental hygiene and improved child care from the beginning of the century, with the addition of antibiotics, mass immunisation and improved medical expertise and technology in the second half of the century.…”

“…The epidemic of cardiovascular disease (CVD) mortality commenced in Australia in the 1920s and rose to a peak around the 1970s, and has since then declined to levels below those at the beginning of the epidemic1–3; the epidemic had a significant effect on trends in all-cause adult mortality and life expectancy 2 3. Similar epidemics of CVD were also evident in especially in Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian countries; however, in southern Europe there was hardly an epidemic at all 1.…”

Health System, Health Equity

“…Another study showed a rapid decline in Infant Mortality Rate in Australia, between 1881 and 1975, which was also long before the discovery of different vaccines and antibiotics (26).…”