Here’s something which may surprise you: if you’re between 15 and 49 years old in Latin America, you’re more likely to die by homicide than anything else.

Treemap comparing causes of death for young adults in Latin America, showing homicide is the leading cause | Sources: Our World in Data, IHME, Global Burden of Disease, Latinometrics
Here are Latin America’s most common young adult deaths

Over a fifth of all young adult deaths in the region stem from homicide, which is comparatively quite high at the global level. Whereas cardiovascular and heart disease is the world’s largest cause of death within this group, in Latin America violence is a far more prevalent issue, as seen in the region’s two largest countries of Brazil and Mexico.

Dot plot showing top causes of death for young adults by country, with homicide being a significant cause in Latin America | Sources: Our World in Data, IHME, Global Burden of Disease, Latinometrics
What are young adults most likely to die of?

Beyond homicide, we get to cancers and cardiovascular disease, in line with much of the world. Countries like Argentina and the Dominican Republic see a plurality of their young-adult deaths from these medical causes. There’s suicide, which unfortunately is a top-5 cause of death in countries as varied and diverse as Colombia, Cuba, Uruguay, and Venezuela.

Then there’s, somewhat surprisingly, road injuries, which claimed an estimated 65K young-adult lives in 2021 and reflected the highest cause of death in this category in both Ecuador and Paraguay.

With the aim of holding our region up to the rest of the world, we think it’s worth examining what can be done to address mortality rates across Latin America’s adult population. Does the strategy include greater investments in mental healthcare or different eating habits? Speedbumps to try to bring down road-related injuries?

We don’t have all the answers, but hopefully as a region we can address these and bring Latin American health trends in line with more developed regions, first and foremost through reducing violence.

What other key trends do you spot in this chart?