fatality rate

noun

plural fatality rates

: the number of deaths from a specific cause

Last year, South Carolina had the nation's third-highest highway fatality rate, with 1,064 people killed in wrecks on the state's roads.

—Joseph S. Stroud

McGuire is a practitioner of what he calls the king of all extreme sports. BASE—an acronym for building, antenna, span (bridge) and earth (cliffs)—jumping has one of the sporting world's highest fatality rates: in its 18-year history, 46 participants have been killed.

—Karl Taro Greenfield

specifically : case fatality rate

Dysentery, in which fatality rates in untreated cases range as high as 50 percent, is especially dangerous to children.

—James C. Riley

Examples of fatality rate in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

The virus has infected over 5,500 people and killed nearly half, with the highest fatality rates in remote Ituri and North Kivu where patients rarely reach treatment centers. — Los Angeles Times, 24 Aug. 2026

These big cities scored as the least safe in America based on their violent crime rates, property crime rates, motor vehicle fatality rates and disaster risks. — Finch Walker, USA Today, 21 Aug. 2026

In this book’s scenario, an explosion at the Siberian lab sets loose a virus that has been designed to spread rapidly, deceive medical professionals, and produce a 100% fatality rate. — The Week Us, TheWeek, 19 Aug. 2026

SmartAsset reviewed cities with populations between 65,000 and 250,000, scoring them based on violent crime rate, property crime rate, auto fatality rate and natural disaster risk. — Kimberly Tutuska, Charlotte Observer, 6 Aug. 2026

Word History

First Known Use

1866, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for fatality rate

• borosilicate
• decontaminate
• deoxycholate
• deteriorate
• differentiate
• diisocyanate
• dinoflagellate
• excommunicate
• incapacitate
• insubordinate
• intercorporate
• interpenetrate

Medical Definition

fatality rate

noun

: the number of deaths from a specific cause

… the inclusion of air bags and other design improvements in vehicles, the use of seat belts and even the increasing maturity of the driving population have combined to lower the fatality rate on U. S. highways by 29 percent since 1987.

—Stefan Thomke et al., Scientific American

specifically : case fatality rate

Dysentery, in which fatality rates in untreated cases range as high as 50 percent, is especially dangerous to children.

—James C. Riley, The American Historical Review