Heart Disease Deaths in New England

Heart disease is the top cause of death in the United States, accounting for more than 659,000 deaths in 2019, or about 23% of all deaths in the USA that year.  Improvements in medical know-how have significantly reduced the heart disease death rate over the past twenty years. From 259.9 deaths per 100,000 population in 1999, by 2019 the death rate attributable to heart disease had dropped to 200.8 deaths per 100,000 population.  Nevertheless, the heart disease death rate nationally has been inching back up since the middle of the last decade.  The national experience with heart disease deaths is mirrored in the six-state New England region, where the 2019 death rate of 192.2 per 100,000 population was 25% lower than it was in 1999.  A deeper dive into data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics, discloses the following about the trend in heart disease deaths in New England:

Heart Disease Deaths in New England

Area/Deaths	1999	2009	2019
CT	9,127	7,105	7,354
MA	15,871	12,322	11,761
ME	3,418	2,674	2,940
NH	2,751	2,268	2,707
RI	3,008	2,411	2,404
VT	1,342	1,171	1,368
Region	35,517	27,951	28,534
U.S.	725,192	599,413	659,041
Area/Death Rate*	1999	2009	2019
CT	269.5	199.5	206.3
MA	251.2	189.1	170.6
ME	269.8	201.1	218.7
NH	225.1	172.3	199.1
RI	289.1	228.8	226.9
VT	221.9	187.4	219.2
Region	256.7	194.1	192.2
U.S.	259.9	195.4	200.8

(*) number of heart disease deaths per 100,000 population

Source: CDC Wonder. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics. Underlying Cause of Death 1999-2019 on CDC WONDER Online Database, released in 2020. Data are from the Multiple Cause of Death Files, 1999-2019, as compiled from data provided by the 57 vital statistics jurisdictions through the Vital Statistics Cooperative Program. Accessed on June 9, 2021