At what age do people die in Costa Rica? Why do they die? Where do they die?
The National Institute of Statistics and Census (INEC), made a collection of data on the “behavior of death” in Costa Rica during 2015.
According to the INEC, the causes of death that top the list are:
-Heart attack.
-Gastric cancer.
-Traffic accident.
The latter replaced acute stroke, which in 1997 reached the third place.
Moreover, according to these data, from the 21,038 people who died in 2015, 55.1% died in a hospital, 35.6% died at home, 3.5% died in public places, 1.3% died in a nursing home and 0.2% died in an ambulance.
Although the data provided by the INEC indicate that the average Costa Ricans’ age of death is 66.9 years, Jacqueline Castillo, head of the Statistics Department from the Costa Rican Social Security Fund (CCSS), declared that currently, the life expectancy is 80.3 years.
In 2012, the Fund conducted the first study on disease and causes of death among Costa Ricans. At that time, heart attacks accounted for 38.5% of deaths. During that year, there were 1,586 deaths.
In the case of gastric cancer, in 2012, one person died every 13 hours as consequence of this disease. In addition, in 2013, 294 people died on the road (it is clear that this figure is related to deaths on the site).