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Half of all causes of death listed on death certificates are mere
guesses—in the Republic of Ireland, at least. After surveying 96 GPs in
the North Western Health Board region, Sean Bourke found that about half felt
their choices of cause of death when no postmortem is carried out are too
limited. Writing “not known” or “old age” is not allowed. “National statistics
are based on what we put down on death certificates, but half the time we’re
just guessing as to a cause of death,” Bourke told the British Medical
Journal(vol 321, p 468). He suspects the problem…