Excess winter mortality in Europe: a cross country analysis identifying key risk factors.

ABSTRACT:

Objective

Much debate remains regarding why certain countries experience dramatically higher winter mortality. Potential causative factors other than cold exposure have rarely been analysed. Comparatively less research exists on excess winter deaths in southern Europe. Multiple time series data on a variety of risk factors are analysed against seasonal-mortality patterns in 14 European countries to identify key relations Subjects and setting: Excess winter deaths (all causes), 1988-97, EU-14.

Design

Coefficients of seasonal variation in mortality are calculated for EU-14 using monthly mortality data. Comparable, longitudinal datasets on risk factors pertaining to climate, macroeconomy, health care, lifestyle, socioeconomics, and housing were also obtained. Poisson regression

SUBMITTER: Healy JD 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC1732295 | biostudies-literature | 2003 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature