The number of deaths by cardiovascular diseases (CVD) is one of most serious health issues, being the leading cause of death worldwide, including Brazil (around 30% in recent years). However, CVD mortality rates are not uniformly distributed across the country. Brazil is marked by important regional differences resulting from socioeconomic inequality and access to health services. Since there is a spatial distribution of causes and spatial heterogeneity of deaths from cardiovascular disease in Brazil, both macro and micro level, the goal of this paper is to investigate how age composition effects and age-specific mortality rates are related to the observed difference in deaths from cardiovascular disease in the adult population (over 30 years of age), by sex, in Brazilian micro-regions from 1996 to 2010. The results suggest that there is a decrease in the rates of mortality from cardiovascular disease, and that both the effect of age structure and the level may have influenced the variation of these deaths in Brazil over the period analyzed. These findings indicate that the Brazilian epidemiological transition is not uniform across and within regions of the country.

Keywords: decomposition; mortality; cardiovascular mortality; Demography; spatial analysis; Brazilian micro-regions.