Figure 1

Age-specific female mortality patterns. Data averaged for the years 1999 and 2000 for non-Hispanic white females in the United States from statistics distributed by the National Center for Health Statistics [17], Worktable Orig291. The top row of panels shows the age-specific death rate per 100,000 individuals on a log-log scale. The columns plot all causes of death, death by heart disease, and death by cancer. The second row of panels shows the same data, but plots the age-specific acceleration of death instead of the age-specific rate of death. Acceleration is the derivative (slope) of the rate curves in the top row. The bottom row takes the plots in the row above, transforms the age axis to a linear scale to spread the ages more evenly, and applies a mild smoothing algorithm that retains the same shape but smooths the jagged curves.