The Northern Grampians has a higher rate of heart and respiratory disease-related fatalities than the Australian average, new data has revealed.
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From 2016 to 2020, 87 people in the Northern Grampians local government area died as a result of heart disease - a rate of 151.9 per 100,000 population, or a third more than the Australian rate.
The data comes from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare's Mortality Over Regions and Time report, which looks at the specific causes of death from across the country.
The latest data from the report has detailed the exact causes of death for the region between 2016-2020 and painted a picture of how Northern Grampians residents were most at risk.
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For women in the Northern Grampians, the biggest killer was heart disease, followed by dementia and stroke.
Heart disease was also the biggest killer in men, followed by chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and prostate cancer.
According to the World Health Organisation, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease was the third leading cause of death worldwide, after heart disease and stroke, and has been linked to tobacco smoke.
Of the years contained in the report, 2017 was the deadliest in the Northern Grampians, with 82 deaths.
Since 2016 the median age of death has also decreased, from 82.8 in 2016 down to 73.8 in 2020.
The Northern Grampians also saw a higher than average suicide rate across the reporting period, with 28.1 per 100,000 people compared to the Australia rate of 19.4 per 100,000.
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