Provisional COVID-19 Mortality by Age Group and Week

Weekly provisional counts of deaths involving COVID-19 reported to the National Center for Health Statistics. Data is organized by state, age group, and MMWR week, with fields for both total deaths and COVID-19 specific deaths. The dataset is maintained by data.cdc.gov and was last updated in April 2025.

Use Cases

• Analyze temporal trends in COVID-19 mortality by comparing `COVID-19 Deaths` across consecutive `MMWR Week` values.
• Assess age-specific mortality risk by calculating death rates per `Age Group` using `COVID-19 Deaths`.
• Compare state-level pandemic impact by aggregating `Total Deaths` and `COVID-19 Deaths` by `State`.
• Track reporting timeliness by examining the lag between `End Date` and `Data As Of` fields.

Strengths

• Data is updated weekly, providing near-real-time surveillance.
• Includes breakdowns by `State` and `Age Group` for granular analysis.
• Contains separate fields for `Total Deaths` and `COVID-19 Deaths` for comparative studies.

Limitations

• Data is provisional and subject to revision, as indicated by the `Footnote` field.
• Sample size and geographic representativeness for smaller states or age groups are unknown.
• Lacks individual-level data, limiting analysis to aggregate counts.

Provenance

Source

data.cdc.gov, sourced from the National Vital Statistics System (NVSS).

Collection Method

Deaths reported to the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) by jurisdiction of occurrence.

Freshness

Updated weekly, with a last update date of 2025-04-21.

Geography

United States, with data reported by `State`.