How You Will Die

Have you ever thought about when and how you will die? Would you want to know if you could? Nathan Yau put together a little algorithm that does just that, and can give you an idea of  how and when you will die, given your sex, race, and age.

Yau explins, "I returned to the Underlying Cause of Death database maintained by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It provides data for the number of people who died in the United States between 1999 and 2014. The records are based on death certificates, which require an entry for a single cause of death.

The CDC classifies the causes into 113 subcategories, which fit under the umbrella of 20 categories of disease and external causes. More specifically, the CDC uses the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems (ICD), which is published by the World Health Organization.

The simulation below covers the main categories, or chapters, as they're referred to by the ICD." 

I put in my stats and watched as it formulated my chances and causes of death at each age. You see each dot represents one of your simulated lives, and as each year passes, more of your simulated selves pass away. Color corresponds to cause of death, and the bars on the right keep track of the cumulative percentages. By the end, you're left with the chances that you will die of each cause.

Take the test HERE