--- title: What Are My Health Risk Factors? description: Most people live past age 65, at which point the top cause of death is heart disease, followed by cancer, according to a tally of all 2.6 million deaths in the U.S. in 2013 canonical: https://time.com/3935281/what-are-my-health-risk-factors/ author: TIME Staff article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-06-25T11:24:08.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T08:31:34.846Z article:section: Health og:title: What Are My Health Risk Factors? og:description: Most people live past age 65, at which point the top cause of death is heart disease, followed by cancer, according to a tally of all 2.6 million deaths in the U.S. in 2013 og:url: https://time.com/3935281/what-are-my-health-risk-factors/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: What Are My Health Risk Factors? twitter:description: Most people live past age 65, at which point the top cause of death is heart disease, followed by cancer, according to a tally of all 2.6 million deaths in the U.S. in 2013 twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # What Are My Health Risk Factors? by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) ## TIME Staff Jun 25, 2015 11:24 AM UTC by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) ## TIME Staff Jun 25, 2015 11:24 AM UTC CHILDREN Drowning is the top cause of accidental death for the youngest children. From ages 5 to 24, motor-vehicle accidents are the leading cause. ADULTS Of the 630,887 people ages 25 to 64 who died, 28,655 committed suicide, most commonly using a firearm. ELDERLY The most common cancer after age 55 is lung cancer, followed by lymphoid and blood cancers. \[The following text appears within a chart. Please see hardcopy or PDF for actual chart.\] AGE UNDER 1 1-4 5-9 10-14 15-24 25-34 35-44 45-54 55-64 65 AND OVER Birth defects Premature births Maternal pregnancy complications SIDS Accidents Homicide Cancer Heart disease Chronic respiratory disease Stroke 20% 32% 31% 27% 41% 36% 22% 26% 34% 26% 18% 12% 18% 15% 16% 20% 22% 21% 7% 12% 7% 8% 7% Suicide 13% 17% 14% 15% 12% 5% 7% 6% 6% 5% 8% 5% 5% 9% 15% 8% 5% 4% 5% 4% 7% 4% 3% 5% 4% 7% 3% Heart disease Cancer Chronic respiratory disease Stroke Alzheimer’s Diabetes Accidents Liver disease Suicide Homicide Top 5 causes of death by percentage of all deaths within each age group Causes outside the top 5 that appear in the top 5 at other ages Total 2013 deaths for that age group 23,440 4,068 2,427 2,913 28,486 45,463 69,573 177,724 338,127 1,904,640 Nearly 75% of people who died in 2013 were over 65; today the life expectancy of a 65-year-old is 84 NOTES: ALL DATA FROM CDC. MATERNAL PREGNANCY COMPLICATIONS INCLUDE ALL GESTATION AND DELIVERY COMPLICATIONS AFFECTING NEWBORNS ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3935281/what-are-my-health-risk-factors/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3935281/what-are-my-health-risk-factors/"},"headline":"What Are My Health Risk Factors?","datePublished":"2015-06-25T11:24:08.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T08:31:34.846Z","description":"Most people live past age 65, at which point the top cause of death is heart disease, followed by cancer, according to a tally of all 2.6 million deaths in the U.S. in 2013","url":"https://time.com/3935281/what-are-my-health-risk-factors/","keywords":[],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME Staff","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/time-staff/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/health/","name":"Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3935281/what-are-my-health-risk-factors/","name":"What Are My Health Risk Factors?"}}]}] ```