Actual causes of death in the United States, 2000.
BACKGROUND
Modifiable behavioral risk factors are leading causes of mortality in the United States. Quantifying these will provide insight into the effects of recent trends and the implications of missed prevention opportunities.


OBJECTIVE
To identify and quantify the leading causes of mortality in the United States.


METHODS
Comprehensive MEDLINE search of English-language articles that identified epidemiological, clinical, and laboratory studies linking risk behaviors and mortality. The search was initially restricted to articles published during or after 1990, but we later included relevant articles published in 1980 to December 31, 2002. Prevalence and relative risk were identified during the literature search. We used 2000 mortality data reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to identify the causes and number of deaths. The estimates of cause of death were computed by multiplying estimates of the cause-attributable fraction of preventable deaths with the total mortality data.


METHODS
Actual causes of death.


RESULTS
The leading causes of death in 2000 were tobacco (435 000 deaths; 18.1% of total US deaths), poor diet and physical inactivity (365 000 deaths; 15.2%) [corrected], and alcohol consumption (85 000 deaths; 3.5%). Other actual causes of death were microbial agents (75 000), toxic agents (55 000), motor vehicle crashes (43 000), incidents involving firearms (29 000), sexual behaviors (20 000), and illicit use of drugs (17 000).


CONCLUSIONS
These analyses show that smoking remains the leading cause of mortality. However, poor diet and physical inactivity may soon overtake tobacco as the leading cause of death. These findings, along with escalating health care costs and aging population, argue persuasively that the need to establish a more preventive orientation in the US health care and public health systems has become more urgent.
Mokdad
Ali H
AH
Division of Adult and Community Health, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, Ga, USA. amokdad@cdc.gov
Marks
James S
JS
Stroup
Donna F
DF
Gerberding
Julie L
JL
D000063:Accidents, Traffic / Q000401:mortality; D000428:Alcohol Drinking; D002423:Cause of Death / Q000639:trends*; D003141:Communicable Diseases / Q000401:mortality; D004032:Diet; D006801:Humans; D010809:Physical Fitness; D011041:Poisoning / Q000401:mortality; D012307:Risk Factors; D012725:Sexual Behavior; D012907:Smoking / Q000401:mortality; D019966:Substance-Related Disorders; D014481:United States / Q000453:epidemiology; D014948:Wounds, Gunshot / Q000401:mortality