Registered Deaths

Summary

The requester asked for clarification on whether death statistics include residents dying in UK hospitals and requested monthly death data from 2016 to September 2022. The authority confirmed that deaths occurring outside the Isle of Man are not held in their registry and directed the requester to an open data portal for monthly figures, while also correcting previous errors in released data.

Key Facts

• Deaths of Isle of Man residents occurring in UK hospitals are not included in Central Registry figures because registration must occur in the district where death happened.
• The Central Registry does not hold information on the number of residents who died in UK hospitals.
• Monthly death data from January 2016 is available via the government open data portal.
• Data for September 2022 was not yet available at the time of the response.
• Previous figures released in response to FOI requests contained errors due to manual compilation issues.

Data Disclosed

• 2018
• 2016
• June 2019
• April 2022
• May 2022
• June 2022
• July 2022
• August 2022
• September 2022
• 2666406
• 1936589
• 2022-09-27
• 2022-10-12
• Section 18 of the Civil Registration Act 1984

Exemptions Cited

• Information not held by the authority (deaths outside the Island are registered in the UK)

Original Request

1. Further to FOI 1936589 please can you confirm if the registered death figures quoted would include for Isle of Man residents who are flown off Island for treatment and subsequently die in a UK hospital such as Walton? 2. If these figures are not included, please can you confirm how many Isle of Man residents have died in a UK hospital from 2018 to the present date split out month by month. 3. Please can you confirm the number of registered deaths for April 2022, May 2022, june 2022, July 2022, August 2022 and Sept 2022. 4. On a previous request you stated it would be difficult and time consuming to find the registered deaths from 2016 to the present day split out by month, so please can you provide the registered deaths month by month from a date where the records are readily accessible to June 2019 (as figures form June 2019 onwards have already been supplied). Thank you

Data Tables (1)

Full Response Text

Freedom of Information Co-ordinator 1st Floor, St Georges Court Upper Church Street, Douglas Isle of Man IM1 1EX

Telephone: (01624 686400) Website: https://www.iomdfenterprise.im/

Our ref: 2666406 11 October 2022

Dear ###

We write further to your request which was received on 27 September 2022 and which states:

"1. Further to FOI 1936589 please can you confirm if the registered death figures quoted would include for Isle of Man residents who are flown off Island for treatment and subsequently die in a UK hospital such as Walton? 2. If these figures are not included, please can you confirm how many Isle of Man residents have died in a UK hospital from 2018 to the present date split out month by month. 3. Please can you confirm the number of registered deaths for April 2022, May 2022, june 2022, July 2022, August 2022 and Sept 2022. 4. On a previous request you stated it would be difficult and time consuming to find the registered deaths from 2016 to the present day split out by month, so please can you provide the registered deaths month by month from a date where the records are readily accessible to June 2019 (as figures form June 2019 onwards have already been supplied). Thank you"

Our response to your request is as follows: 1. & 2. This information is not held by the Central Registry, Figures provided by the Central Registry relating to the number of deaths registered do not include deaths that occurred outside the Island. Section 18 of the Civil Registration Act 1984 requires ‘the death of every person dying in the Island and the cause thereof to be registered…’. If a person dies in the UK, the death registration must take place in the relevant district where the death occurred. With this in mind, you will hopefully understand that we are not able to answer your question about how many Isle of Man residents have died in a UK hospital, as the information is not held by the Central Registry.

1. and 4. The information requested is freely available at the following link: https://www.gov.im/about-the-government/government/open-data/health-and-social- care/ and by scrolling to the bottom of the page and clicking on the link you can download monthly data from January 2016. Information for September 2022 is not yet available, but will be published on this page in due course. In reviewing the data and publishing this information, the Central Registry has noted that some of the figures previously released in response to FOIA requests have not been correct, those released and the correct figures are provided below: These discrepancies occurred for a number of reasons, the mainly due to errors in the manual compilation of the figures. In some cases, numbers were also amended to reflect updated information – registrars other than Douglas, are required to make quarterly returns confirming details of all deaths registered in the respective offices, although generally details are provided much more frequently than quarterly. Please quote the reference number 2666406 in any future communications.

Your right to request a review

If you are unhappy with this response to your freedom of information request, you may ask us to carry out an internal review of the response, by completing a complaint form and submitting it electronically or by delivery/post.

An electronic version of our complaint form can be found by going to our website at https://services.gov.im/freedom-of-information/Review . If you would like a paper version of our complaint form to be sent to you by post, please contact me and I will be happy to arrange for this. Your review request should explain why you are dissatisfied with this response, and should be made as soon as practicable. We will respond as soon as the review has been concluded.

If you are not satisfied with the result of the review, you then have the right to appeal to the Information Commissioner for a decision on; 1. Whether we have responded to your request for information in accordance with Part 2 of the Freedom of Information Act 2015; or

1. Whether we are justified in refusing to give you the information requested.
   In response to an application for review, the Information Commissioner may, at any time, attempt to resolve a matter by negotiation, conciliation, mediation or another form of alternative dispute resolution and will have regard to any outcome of this in making any subsequent decision. More detailed information on your right to a review can be found on the Information Commissioner’s website at www.inforights.im. Should you have any queries concerning this letter, please do not hesitate to contact me. Further information about freedom of information requests can be found at www.gov.im/foi.

I will now close your request as of this date.

Freedom of Information Co-Ordinator