Transactions and Proceedings of the New Zealand Institute 1882 [electronic resource]

Remarks on Statistical Tables. By F. W. Frankland.

“Frequent comparisons have been made between the general death-rate of New Zealand and the death-rates which obtain in England and other countries; and it has been sought to establish on the basis of this comparison the fact of the salubrity of this country. The fact that the annual number of deaths in New Zealand is 11 or 12 per 1,000 living, and that in England it is 23 per 1,000 living, has been held by some to prove that, whatever may be the reason, the human constitution resists death more successfully here than in the mother-country. Even so high an authority as Dr. Drysdale, who has done so much for the propagation of sound views on hygienic matters, appears to have recently fallen into this error. To expose the fallacy of the reasoning we have referred to, it is only necessary to point out that in every country the liability of an individual to death varies enormously according to the age of the individual. It is, in mathematical language, a function of the age.

“The liability to death is always very high during the first year of life, and decreases with great rapidity till the age of 10 or 12 is attained, when it reaches a minimum. The annual deaths among 10,000 children, aged about 10 or 12, would be fewer than those among 10,000 individuals at any other age of life. With the advent of puberty, the liability to death begins to increase, and, barring a short halt during the early period of manhood, it increases progressively, and with constantly augmenting rapidity, throughout all the rest of life, till in old age it is higher even than in infancy. It follows from this that the general death-rate of a country must depend on the distribution of the population according to age, and that, until this distribution is taken into account, it is absolutely valueless as a test of the real vitality of the inhabitants. A moment's reflection will convince the reader, and a very short consultation of statistical tables will bear the conviction out, that in New Zealand there is a much larger proportion of people at the younger and middle ages of life, than there is in an old and settled country like

England. The smallness of our general death-rate is, therefore, utterly inconclusive as a test of our real vitality, and it becomes necessary to ascertain the death-rate, not merely en bloc, but at all the separate ages of life. This has been done in the accompanying tables.

“So far as the present writer is aware, only one such comparison has ever been made before for this colony. It is contained in an article ‘On the Additional Premium required for Residence in Foreign Climates,’ by Mr. James Meikle, the eminent Scotch actuary, published in the nineteenth volume of ‘The Journal of the Institute of Actuaries.’ It may, therefore, be well to quote the words in which Mr. Meikle summarized the results he arrived at. ‘From the Census Enumeration,’ he says,^*‘which gives the number of lives in existence in March, 1874, and from the number of deaths in the year 1873, I am enabled to show the rate of mortality during each quinquennium of life, and thus to eliminate the effect of immigration, and the consequent irregular distribution of the lives according to age, as compared with the population of this country. The result compares favourably with any other table.^† It is very much lighter than either the H^m^† or the Carlisle§. ^§ I have not made any adjustment of the figures in respect of the progressive increase of the population, or for the deaths being those for the year anterior to the census * * * The results show an exceedingly light rate of mortality.† When measured by the annual premium for a life assurance, I should imagine that the New Zealand rate would require about 7½ or 10 per cent. less premium than the H^m rate. Before, however, placing much confidence in the results, they would require to be verified at the next census.' The verification which Mr. Meikle here speaks of, we have now accomplished,—and more. It will be seen that we have included in our tables the results of the three last census years, namely,—1874, 1878, and 1881; and it is satisfactory to be able to point out that the larger data we have thus collected, fully confirm his conclusion as to the low rate of mortality which prevails in this colony.”

[Footnote] *‘Journal of Institute of Actuaries,’ vol. xix., p. 291.

[Footnote] † The italics are our own.

[Footnote] †A table founded on the experience of twenty British insurance offices, and accepted as the best exponent of the mortality of assured life.

[Footnote] § A well-known table, accepted as a fairly good exponent of average mortality.

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	Mean Population during 1874.						Deaths during 1874.
Ages.	Persons.	Males.	Females.		Actual No. of Deaths.			No. of Deaths per 100 living.
				Persons.	Males.	Females.	Persons.	Males.	Females.
All ages.	315,860.	180,139.	135,721.
Under 1	12,050	6,163	5,887	1,394	751	643	1.57	1.19	1.92
1 to 2	9,481	4,733	4,748	349	165	184	3.68	3.49	3.88.
2 to 3	11,163	5,676	5,487	148	68	80	1.33	1.20	1.46
3 to 4	11,174	5,542	5,632	104	53	51	0.93	0.96	0.91
4 to 5	10,861	5,395	5,466	84	50	34	0.77	0.93	0.62
5 to 10	45,674	22,962	22,712	272	136	136	0.60	0.59	0.60
10 to 15	30,423	15,411	15,012	85	41	44	0.28	0.27	0.29
15 to 20	22,920	11,501	11,419	97	55	42	0.42	0.48	0.37
20 to 25	23,806	12,860	10,946	114	63	51	0.48	0.49	0.47
25 to 30	27,360	16,157	11,203	180	100	80	0.66	0.62	0.71
30 to 35	31,748	20,720	11,028	209	126	83	0.66	0.61	0.75
35 to 40	26,399	18,006	8,393	239	157	82	0.91	0.87	0.98
40 to 45	20,038	13,910	6,128	201	142	59	1.00	1.02	0.96
45 to 50	11,364	7,704	3,660	148	112	36	1.30	1.45	0.98
50 to 55	8,574	5,533	3,041	137	93	44	1.60	1.68	1.45
55 to 60	4,835	2,978	1,857	97	69	28	2.01	2.32	1.51
60 to 65	3,514	2,096	1,418	67	44	23	1.91	2.10	1.62
65 to 70	1,852	1,126	726	75	50	25	4.05	4.44	3.44
70 to 75	1,294	785	509	72	39	33	5.56	4.97	6.48
75 to 80	474	266	208	37	20	17	7.81	7.52	8.17
80 and upwards	227	115	112	39	21	18	1.18	1.26	1.07
Unspecified	629	500	129	13	11	2

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	Mean Population during 1878.						Deaths during 1878.
Ages.	Persons.	Males.	Females.		Actual No. of Deaths.			No. of Deaths per 100 living.
				Persons.	Males.	Females.	Persons.	Males.	Females.
All Ages.	41,927.	233,875.	186,052.
			4,645	2,719	1,926	1.106	1.162	1.035
Under 1	16,330	8,327	8,003	1,500	822	678	9.19	9.87	8.47
1 to 2	13,570	6,833	6,737	308	162	146	2.27	2.37	2.17
2 to 3	14,685	7,549	7,136	103	64	39	70	.85	.55
3 to 4	13,474	6,746	6,728	75	35	40	.56	.52	.59
4 to 5	12,599	6,367	6,232	39	11	28	.31	.17	.45
5 to 10	60,389	30,205	30,184	176	92	84	.29	.30	.28
10 to 15	46,267	23,368	22,899	101	53	48	.22	.23	.21
15 to 20	33,684	16,682	17,002	95	47	48	.28	.28	.28
20 to 25	35,285	19,352	15,933	177	88	89	.50	.46	.56
25 to 30	34,936	20,244	14,692	203	113	90	.58	.56	.61
30 to 35	32,791	19,576	13,215	197	105	92	.60	.54	.70
35 to 40	32,916	21,160	11,756	298	195	103	.91	.92	.88
40 to 45	26,296	17,427	8,869	254	186	68	.97	1.07	.77
45 to 50	17,223	11,459	5,764	261	189	72	1.52	1.65	1.25
50 to 55	11,000	7,171	3,829	175	127	48	1.60	1.77	1.25
55 to 60	6,647	4,167	2,480	142	93	49	2.14	2.23	1.98
60 to 65	4,613	2,721	1,892	130	84	46	2.82	3.09	2.43
65 to 70	2,601	1,533	1,068	101	59	42	3.88	3.85	3.93
70 to 75	1,602	927	675	96	60	36	5.99	6.47	5.33
75 to 80	839	493	346	84	50	34	10.01	10.14	9.83
80 and upwards	365	190	175	59	30	29	16.16	15.79	16.57
Unspecified	1,815	1,378	437	71	54	17

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	Mean Population during 1881.						Deaths during 1881.
Ages.	Persons.	Males.	Females.		Actual No. of Deaths.			No. of Deaths per 100 living.
				Persons.	Males.	Females.	Males.	Females.
All ages.	493,069.	271,124.	221,945.
			5,491	3,247	2,244	1.114	1.198	1.011
Under 1	18,070	9,261	8,809	1,731	987	744	9.58	10.66	8.45
1 to 2	14,984	7,526	7,458	391	204	187	2.61	2.71	2.51.
2 to 3	16,964	8,573	8,391	125	60	65	.74	.70	.77
3 to 4	16,655	8,327	8,328	106	49	57	.64	.59	.68
4 to 5	16,149	8,184	7,965	87	49	38	.54	.60	.48
5 to 10	63,354	34,498	33,856	230	132	98	.34	.38	.29
10 to 15	57,995	29,037	28,958	161	83	78	.28	.29	.27
15 to 20	42,885	21,178	21,707	159	77	82	.37	.36	.38
20 to 25	41,631	22,202	19,429	199	119	80	.48	.54	.41
25 to 30	40,843	24,051	16,792	234	131	103	.57	.55	.61
30 to 35	34,814	20,316	14,498	235	133	102	.68	.66	.70
35 to 40	33,774	20,432	13,342	276	167	109	.82	.82	.82
40 to 45	31,294	20,212	11,082	311	218	93	.9	1.08	.84
45 to 50	21,474	14,051	7,423	269	193	76	1.25	1.37	1.02
50 to 55	14,654	9,607	5,047	219	148	71	1.49	1.54	1.41
55 to 60	7,868	4,882	2,986	172	132	40	2.19	2.70	1.34
60 to 65	6,379	3,830	2,549	167	117	50	2.62	3.06	1.96
65 to 70	3,254	1,890	1,364	129	81	48	3.96	4.29	3.52
70 to 75	2,100	1,182	918	107	67	40	5.10	5.67	4.36
75 to 80	999	585	414	87	45	42	8.71	7.69	10.14
80 and upwards	588	324	264	85	46	39	14.46	14.20	14.77
Unspecified	1,341	976	365	11	9	2

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Aggregate Results for the three Census Years 1874, 1878, 1881.
Ages.	Persons.	Males.	Females.	Persons.	Males.	Females.	Persons.	Males.	Females.
	Aggregate Mean Populations.				Aggregate Deaths.			Mean Death-rate per 100 Living.
All Ages.	1,228,856.	685,138.	543,718.	14,297.	8,332.	5,965.	1.1634.	1.2161.	1.0971.
Under 1	46,450	23,751	22,699	4,625	2,560	2,065	9.957	10.779	9.096
1 to 2	38,035	19,092	18,943	1,048	531	517	2.755	2.781	2.729
2 to 3	42,812	21,798	21,014	376	192	.184	.878	.881	.876
3 to 4	41,303	20,615	20,688	285	137	148	.690	.665	.715
4 to 5	39,609	19,946	19,663	210	110	100	.530	.552	.509
5 to 10	174,417	87,665	86,752	678	360	318	.389	.411	.367
10 to 15	134,685	67,816	66,869	347	177	170	.258	.261	.254
15 to 20	99,489	49,361	50,128	351	179	172	.353	.363	.343
20 to 25	100,722	54,414	46,308	490	270	220	.487	.496	.475
25 to 30	103,139	60,452	42,687	617	344	273	.598	.569	.640
30 to 35	99,353	60,612	38,741	641	364	277	.645	.600	.715
35 to 10	93,089	59,598	33,491	813	519	294	.873	.871	.878
40 to 45	77,628	51,549	26,079	766	546	220	.987	1.059	.844
45 to 50	50,061	33,214	16,847	678	494	184	1.354	1.487	1.092
50 to 55	34,228	22,311	11,917	531	368	163	1.551	1.649	1.368
55 to 60	19,350	12,027	7,323	411	294	117	2.124	2.444	1.598
60 to 65	14,506	8,647	5,859	364	245	119	2.509	2.833	2.031
65 to 70	7,707	4,549	3,158	305	190	115	3.960	4.180	3.643
70 to 75	4,996	2,894	2,102	275	166	109	5.504	5.736	5.166
75 to 80	2,312	1,344	968	208	115	93	9.000	8.557	9.607
80 and upwards	1,180	629	551	183	97	86	15.522	15.446	15.608
Unspecified	3,785	2,854	931	95	74	21

This shows mortality is not simply a result of climate, but is due to many other causes. Some of these agencies will soon be powerless, whilst others will long exist. To their consideration it is necessary to devote some time, otherwise any person examining these tables will be led into many errors. It is not right to say, as some have said, that our low mortality is due to climate solely, or to abundance of cheap food alone. The mortality of any country is a result of many interacting forces.

Amongst the causes leading to a low death-rate in this colony are the following:—