Avoidable mortality is a metric to assess how effectively public health and healthcare systems reduce deaths that should not occur in the presence of effective prevention and timely, high-quality care. It measures deaths from preventable causes, which can be addressed through population-wide public health and primary prevention policies, and treatable causes, for which appropriate and timely healthcare interventions can substantially reduce mortality risks.
Across the 25 Latin American and Caribbean (LAC25) countries included in this analysis, avoidable mortality was substantially higher than OECD average in 2023. Using the OECD – LAC standard population, total avoidable mortality in LAC reaches 297 deaths per 100 000 population, compared with 162 per 100 000 across the OECD (Figure 7.1). The gap is already large among men (378 versus 220 deaths per 100 000), while avoidable mortality among women is twice as high in LAC countries as in the OECD (222 versus 109 deaths per 100 000). Total avoidable mortality ranges from 155 deaths per 100 000 population in Chile to around 200 in Costa Rica and Panama to over 500 deaths per 100 000 in Guyana, pointing to large differences in both prevention and health system performance across countries.
Treatable mortality is also markedly higher across LAC countries, pointing to deficiencies in timely access to and quality of care. In the LAC19, treatable mortality reaches 274 deaths per 100 000 among men and 196 among women, versus 117 and 67 in the OECD. The lowest treatable mortality rates in the region are seen in Panama (163; 70), Argentina (171; 75) and Costa Rica (184; 66), while the highest are observed in Paraguay (513; 270), Peru (437; 194) and Brazil (393; 191). Across countries, treatable mortality is consistently higher among men than women – for example, LAC19 shows a gap of 78 deaths per 100 000 (274 vs. 196), and Paraguay a gap of 243 (513 vs. 270) –highlighting persistent gender differences in health risks and health-seeking, alongside system constraints affecting both sexes (Figure 7.2).
Preventable mortality contributes substantially to the avoidable mortality gap. In the LAC25, preventable mortality averages 237 deaths per 100 000 among men and 102 among women, compared with 153 and 61 in the OECD. The lowest rates in the region are observed in Chile (men 134, women 54 per 100 000), close to OECD levels, followed by Argentina (143; 59), Panama (151; 62) and Costa Rica (182; 59). At the other end, preventable mortality is highest in Guyana (458; 199), Belize (347; 158) and Jamaica (307; 194), signalling major gaps in prevention, risk-factor control and access to quality primary care (Figure 7.3).
