Rural, regional and remote health: a study on mortality

This report examines whether mortality rates are higher for Australians living in regional and remote areas than in the major cities. It examines statistics on rates for all causes of death and for specific causes, including disease, injury, and suicide, and compares major cities, inner and outer regional, remote and very remote, coastal and inland areas, socioeconomic backgrounds, and Indigenous and non-Indigenous people. The study found that death rates are higher outside the major cities, though they vary by age and location. They are about 1.1 times higher in regional areas and 1.7 times in very remote areas. This is primarily due to larger populations of Indigenous people in remote areas, with a death rate of over 3 times that of non-Indigenous people in major cities. However, rates for older people in remote areas were generally lower than for major cities.