COVID-19 becomes top three leading cause of Australian deaths

It's the first time in five decades an infectious disease has been in the top five leading causes, when influenza and pneumonia ranked fifth in 1970.

The median age of those who died from COVID-19 was 85.8 years, and a third of people had a pre-existing cardiac condition.

Nearly 10,000 deaths were from COVID-19 in 2022, the third year of the pandemic, compared to 1122 deaths in 2021 and 898 in 2020.

A further 2800 people died of other causes but COVID-19 was listed as a contributor.

Broken down to states and territories, COVID-19 was ranked third leading cause of death in NSW, ACT, Victoria and South Australia, sixth in Queensland, Western Australia and Tasmania, and ninth in the Northern Territory.

There were 190,939 deaths total in 2022, up almost 20,000 on the previous year, according to new data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

"The top five causes of death in 2022 were ischaemic heart disease, dementia (including Alzheimer's disease), COVID-19, cerebrovascular diseases (strokes) and lung cancer," ABS' Lauren Moran said.

"Which when combined accounted for more than a third of all deaths."

It's the first time since 2006 that the top five leading causes has changed.

For Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people the leading causes of death were ischaemic heart disease, diabetes, chronic lung diseases, lung cancer and suicide, while COVID-19 ranked ninth.

Influenza returned to the top 20 causes with 305 deaths after dropping to its lowest number on record in 2021, with just two deaths.

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