Unmasking the Underlying Causes: A Cross-Sectional Analysis of Mortality From Intentional and Unintentional Injuries in the United Arab Emirates

Abstract

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has experienced substantial development in infrastructure and transportation in the last few decades. Although available evidence suggests that the incidence of injuries has considerably increased in the previous few years, there is a scarcity of literature that comprehensively analyzed the mortality due to different types of injuries in the UAE. Therefore, the current study was designed to report mortality due to various intentional and unintentional injuries in the UAE. Secondary data was obtained from the World Health Organization (WHO) mortality database. We targeted injuries-specific mortality datasets. We applied a filter (UAE) to retrieve mortality data from unintentional and intentional injuries in the UAE. The latest data in the WHO mortality database was for 2020-21. A total of 10,357 death records from the UAE were present in the WHO mortality database. The percentage of injury-specific deaths out of total deaths was 8.69% (n=900). Injury-specific mortality rate per 100,000 population was 9.09. The percentage of injury-specific deaths was higher for males (87.3%, n=786) and the age group 25-34 years (n=323, 35.9%). Of the 900 injury-specific deaths, 449 (49.9%) were due to unintentional injuries, 216 (24.0%) were due to unintentional injuries, while the remaining (26.1%, n=235) deaths occurred due to Ill-defined injuries. More than half (53.7%, n=241) of unintentional injuries were because of road traffic injuries (RTIs) followed by fall (14.7%, n=66), exposure to mechanical forces (6.5%, n=29), drowning (6.0%, n=27) fire (1.1%, n=5), poisonings (1.1%, n=5), natural disasters (n=1, 0.2%) and other unintentional injuries (16.7%, n=75). More than three-quarters (83.3%, n=180) of intentional injuries were because of self-inflicted injuries while the remaining (16.7%, n=36) intentional injuries-specific deaths occurred due to violence. Many deaths in the UAE occur due to unintentional and intentional injuries. RTIs and falls are the leading causes of unintentional injury-specific deaths, while self-inflicted injuries and violence are the leading causes of intentional injury-specific deaths.