This statistical release presents information on mortality and causes of death in South Africa, based on deaths collected through the civil registration system maintained by the Department of Home Affairs (DHA). The main objective of the statistical release is to outline differentials in mortality by selected socio-demographic characteristics and causes of death for deaths that occurred in 2012. Deaths for the years 1997–2011 are also included to provide information on trends in mortality and causes of death.

The results show that there has been a consistent decline in the number of deaths in South Africa since 2007. In 2012, there were 480 476 deaths that occurred in South Africa and were registered at the Department of Home Affairs (DHA).

The highest proportion of deaths in 2012 occurred amongst age group 35–39 years (7,5%)  and the lowest proportion of deaths were observed in age group 10–14 years at 0,8%. There were higher proportions of male deaths (52,3%) compared to female deaths (47,7%). The provinces where the highest number of deaths occurred were Gauteng (20,5%), KwaZulu-Natal (20,1%), and Eastern Cape (13,6%).
 
Majority of deaths that occurred in 2012 resulted from the main group of certain infectious and parasitic diseases (22,2%), followed by diseases of the circulatory system (16,4%). This pattern was also observed in 2010–2011, although the proportion of deaths due to certain infectious and parasitic diseases decreased consistently during this period but increased for deaths due to diseases of the circulatory system during the same period

Tuberculosis remained the first leading cause of death in South Africa, a position that it has held since 1997. However, the proportion of deaths due to tuberculosis has decreased in the recent past, contributing 9,9% of deaths in 2012. The second leading cause of death was influenza and pneumonia (5,5%), which has also maintained its rank as the second leading cause of death. The major change observed between 2010 and 2012 in the ranking of the ten leading causes of death were intestinal infectious diseases which were the third leading cause of death in 2010 but moved to ninth position in 2012.

With regard to sex differentials, tuberculosis was ranked the first leading cause of death for both males and females. The second leading cause of death amongst males was influenza and pneumonia with cerebrovascular diseases ranked third, whilst for females it was vice versa.

Age differentials show that intestinal infectious diseases were ranked the first leading cause of death amongst those aged 0–14 years; tuberculosis was most common among ages 15–64 years; whilst for those age 65 years and older cerebrovascular diseases were the leading cause of death. Furthermore, tuberculosis was the leading cause of death in all provinces except for Western Cape and Limpopo, where diabetes mellitus and influenza and pneumonia were the leading causes of death respectively. Tuberculosis was also the leading cause of death in the majority of district municipalities.

Although the number of deaths due to natural causes were higher than the number of deaths due to non-natural causes, the proportion of deaths due to non-natural cause have been on a slight increase in the recent years. For example, a proportion of 8,9%  deaths in 2010 were due to non-natural causes, increasing to 9,1% in 2011 then 9,8 in 2012. Deaths due to non-natural causes were mainly dominated by those due to other external causes of accidental injury (60,1%) followed by event of undetermined intent (14,7%). There were 11,2% non-natural deaths due to traffic accidents and 10,2% due to assault. The province with the highest proportion of deaths due to traffic accidents was Limpopo.

The ages that were mostly affected by non-natural causes were 5–29 years. More males died of non-natural causes compared to females. Western Cape had the highest proportion of deaths due to non-natural causes compared to other provinces.