New data released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) show that the overall U.S. death rate in 2025 fell to the lowest level on record, but influenza and pneumonia ranked among the top 10 causes of death in the United States for the first time in years.
The U.S. death rate fell 4.6% last year, from 722.1 deaths per 100,000 people in 2024 to 689.2, according to the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics. Death rates are trending downward across all age groups and nearly all demographic groups tracked by the interim report.
Farida, a CDC health scientist and co-author of the report. Farida Ahmad said the record-low mortality rate was largely due to the continued decline in drug overdose deaths. Another big factor, she added, is that the number of deaths from COVID-19 is no longer as high as before.
In this context, the fatalities of influenza and pneumonia stand out. The two diseases jumped from 11th to eighth place in the ranking of causes of death among all age groups, causing a total of 56,511 deaths in 2025, compared with 48,139 in 2024. This is also the first time since 2020 that influenza-like illnesses have ranked among the top ten causes of death.