Heart Disease Deaths in the Great Plains Region

Heart disease is the top cause of death in the United States, accounting for more than 659,000 deaths in 2019, or approximately 23% of all deaths in the USA that year.  Advancements in medical know-how have materially lowered the heart disease death rate over the past twenty years. From a 1999 level of 259.9 deaths per 100,000 population, by 2019 the heart disease death rate had declined to 200.8 deaths per 100,000 population, a drop of more than 22%.  The seven-state Great Plains region saw its heart disease death rate drop about 24% in the twenty years from 1999, a slightly better experience than the nation as a whole. On the whole, the region's 2019 heart disease death rate was slightly worse than the national average, due in large part to particularly high death rates in Iowa and Missouri.  A deeper examination of data from the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics reveals the following about the trend in heart disease deaths in the Great Plains region:

Heart Disease Deaths in the Great Plains Region

Area/Deaths	1999	2009	2019
IA	8,699	6,938	7,505
KS	6,975	5,294	6,140
MN	9,533	7,238	8,401
MO	17,974	13,916	15,018
NE	4,497	3,277	3,540
ND	1,833	1,431	1,448
SD	2,024	1,778	1,840
Region	51,535	39,872	43,892
U.S.	725,192	599,413	659,041
Area/Death Rate*	1999	2009	2019
IA	298.2	228.8	237.9
KS	260.4	186.9	210.8
MN	195.6	137.1	149.0
MO	323.2	233.4	244.7
NE	263.8	180.8	183.0
ND	284.5	215.2	190.0
SD	269.7	220.3	208.0
Region	269.4	195.5	204.8
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