FOI reference: FOI-2026-3633
You asked
I am requesting information concerning the availability and use of ethnicity data in relation to deaths registered as suicide in England and Wales.
Please provide:
1. Whether the Office for National Statistics holds ethnicity data relating to individuals whose deaths have been registered following a coroner's conclusion of suicide.
2. If such data are held:
a. the source of the ethnicity information (for example, death registration, NHS records, Census linkage or another administrative source)
b. the years for which such data are available
c. the methodology used to link ethnicity data to registered deaths.
3. Any statistical reports, analyses or datasets produced since 1 January 2020 examining suicide deaths by ethnicity.
4. Any metadata, technical guidance, methodology papers or documentation explaining how ethnicity data relating to suicide deaths are collected, linked, quality assured and reported.
5. Any correspondence, briefing papers, meeting minutes or reports between the Office for National Statistics and:
a. the Ministry of Justice
b. the Office of the Chief Coroner
c. the Department of Health and Social Care
d. NHS England
concerning the recording, linkage, quality or publication of ethnicity data relating to suicide deaths.
6. Any reviews or discussions held since 1 January 2020 regarding improving the collection or publication of ethnicity information in national suicide statistics.
7. If the requested information is not held, please confirm whether no such information exists or whether it is held by another public authority, and if so, identify that authority where possible.
We said
Thank you for your request.
The analysis, data and statistics described in our response predominantly refer to all-cause mortality broken down by ethnicity, not suicides by ethnicity specifically. The all-cause mortality releases are mentioned, as they will include suicides by virtue of being applicable to all deaths, and potentially be of interest to you, but they do not present suicides separate from other deaths. The one exception is the Sociodemographic inequalities in suicides in England and Wales: 2011 to 2021 bulletin.
Our mortality statistics are derived from information collected at death registration. These data enable us to publish regular statistics on suicides in England and Wales. We publish quarterly suicide death registrations in England and annual registered deaths from suicide in England and Wales using this data.
Until September 2024, ethnicity was not collected on the death registration. With the introduction of Death Certification Reform (DCR) in England and Wales, ethnicity is now collected.
Initial analysis can be found in our Death Certification Reform, England and Wales: 9 September 2024 to 30 June 2025 article. Until we have fully investigated the quality of this ethnicity information, we will not be using it to produce statistics on deaths (including suicides) by ethnicity.
Death certification reform also introduces a new medical certificate of cause of death (MCCD) with new data fields, including:
- line 1d in the "cause of death" section, which brings the MCCD in line with international standards
- ethnicity of deceased, as self-declared by the patient on the medical record
- questions about whether the deceased was pregnant, and whether the pregnancy contributed to the death, which brings the MCCD in line with international standards
And a new medical examiner medical certificate of cause of death (ME MCCD) allows medical examiners to certify natural deaths in rare cases where no medical practitioner is available. It applies when the cause of death is known, deemed non-coronial by a senior coroner, and helps avoid unnecessary post-mortems or uncertified deaths.
More detailed information about death certification reform will be provided in updates to our User guide to mortality statistics methodology and Mortality statistics in England and Wales quality and methodology information (QMI).
In addition to DCR meaning ethnicity is now on the death certificate, we created the Public Health Data Asset (PHDA) in 2020 by linking data from the 2011 Census respondents who lived in England to Hospital Episodes Statistics and death registration records. It was established to investigate inequalities in mortality and morbidity and further our understanding of the social determinants of health. Further information on the PHDA can be found in this International Journal of Epidemiology article, Cohort Profile: The Public Health Data Asset, 2011 cohort.
Given that your FOI request is specifically interested in suicides, then we note that both DCR and the PHDA are not specific to suicides analysis; that is, the links provided pertain to the quality of the new ethnicity data on the death certificate in general (for the death certification reform report), and the quality of the linkage between Census and mortality data in general (not the linkage of suicides to Census data specifically).
Therefore, while there will be unpublished internal emails, reports or minutes relating to DCR and the PHDA (beyond the published links provided in this response), they will not be specific to the analysis of suicides by ethnicity and so are out of scope of this request.
On suicides by ethnicity in particular, we did use the linked 2011 Census and death registration data in the PHDA to produce the Sociodemographic inequalities in suicides in England and Wales: 2011 to 2021 bulletin. This bulletin includes rates of suicide by ethnic group in England and Wales and showed that rates of suicide were highest in the White and Mixed/Multiple ethnic groups for both men and women. Please also refer to Section 5 – Measuring the data, which provides details of how the data were collected, linked, quality assured and reported.
We are also currently undertaking a project on all-cause mortality by ethnicity using linked death registration data and 2021 Census data. However, again, this project is not specific to suicides. As such, we are not aware of any correspondence, briefing papers, minutes or reports regarding this.
However, owing to the timeframe for question 5, we cannot absolutely rule out that the topic could have been mentioned in the history of all ONS correspondence with the referenced other government departments; but to definitively determine this would exceed the cost limit for FOIA compliance (24 working hours for one person to search for and collate relevant records).
We do not hold information in scope of question 6.
Regarding question 7, the Department of Health and Social Care, NHS England and the Ministry of Justice may hold information relating to policy considerations concerning ethnicity and suicide and you may wish to contact these departments.
The teams that work on mortality and suicides data and statistics would be pleased to speak to you further to understand your interest more fully and advise you on whether any future developments may lead to the statistics or analysis you are keen to see. They can be contacted on health.data@ons.gov.uk.