Statistics agency CBS does not provide a direct explanation for the decline. The figures show that fewer and fewer people are dying from the coronavirus. Of all the people who died in the first nine months of 2023, the virus was the cause of death in less than 2 percent. In the same months in 2022 it was 5 percent, in 2021 about 13 percent and in 2020 about 14 percent.
Life expectancy is increasing. A girl born last year could live to be over 83 years old on average, and a boy over 80 years old. Compared to 2022, life expectancy has increased by three months.
More than half of all deaths were 80 years or older. The Netherlands has more and more elderly people due to an aging population. Just over half of the deceased are women, which has been the case since 1997.