Eliminating statistical discontinuities in mortality series by causes of death: the case of East Germany

A notable mortality gap between East and West Germany that persisted for decades began to narrow rapidly right after the unification of the two states. Despite extensive research, the factors underlying the remarkable improvement in East Germany are still not fully understood. One of the reasons for that is a number of significant changes in the classification of causes of death as well as the changes in coding practices. These changes which happened to coincide in time with profound socioeconomic transformation of East Germany have complicated the interpretation of mortality trends and made the international comparisons difficult. In this paper, we explore the complex methodological issues related to the changes in the system of data collection and classification. Our ultimate goal is to obtain the detailed mortality series for East Germany which can be comparable across time and countries. We rely on the official mortality data and the method of a posteriori reconstruction of mortality trends. The method was successfully implemented for a number of countries including West Germany. The intended work continues this well-established research line. Its outcome is expected to contribute towards better understanding of the health changes observed in East Germany, and facilitate further research in this direction.