The European shortlist of causes of death, is a tool for international comparisons of mortality data, primarily for analysis at regional level and for the analysis of long-term results, such as retrospective studies and mortality projections. The current European shortlist, developed in 2012, covers 86 causes of death (COD) under 17 different categories. It is based on the 3-digit level codes of the 10th revision of the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems (ICD) of the World Health Organization (WHO). It is mapped to codes from previous versions of ICD, ICD-9 and ICD-8, which allows for the comparison of mortality data with previous versions of ICD, including historical comparisons and the analysis of long-term results such as retrospective studies.
The shortlist includes the causes of death most relevant for the EU and policy makers. The basis on which the causes were selected for this list were:
- of relevance with respect to EU mortality patterns,
- of relevance of national and sub-national health programmes,
- of relevance for disaggregation by regional (NUTS2) level,
- of special importance to mortality trends and projections,
- subject of ‘frequently asked questions’.
The shortlist does not include codes for COVID-19; codes for COVID-19 were introduced by WHO as emergency codes and implemented by Eurostat as of reference year 2020 in collection and dissemination of data.