families
Die without a job, a spouse or property, and your death may never be formally recorded by the government.
A new study has found that families of people who die as infants, young children, unmarried and jobless are less likely to register those deaths.
The majority just obtain a burial permit for such people and never complete the registration process to obtain a death certificate.
Kenyan law requires full death registration within six months because it helps health officials understand patterns of death, identify groups at risk and plan services to meet the country's health needs.
Dr Caroline Osoro, an epidemiologist at the Kemri-Wellcome Trust Research Programme in Nairobi, and her colleagues examined 1,387 deaths that occurred in 2022 and 2023 in select parts of Nairobi, Kisumu and Kilifi.
They found that only 257 deaths out of 1,387, or 18.5 per cent, were registered, meaning families of most people who died only obtained a notification or burial permit but did not fully register those deaths.
“Despite near-complete death notification/issued burial permits across the three… sites, formal registration, which is legal recognition, remains strikingly low, indicating a structural failure between notification and registration,” Dr Osoro and her colleagues noted.
They found most deaths that were registered were of people who left behind property, insurance or benefits that families required official documents to claim.
Where there are no such claims to pursue, relatives saw little value in completing the death registration process.
Inheritance-related requirements were the leading reason for registration, cited in 36.7 per cent of cases in the study, followed by insurance claims and social benefits at 35.6 per cent.
A further 23.3 per cent of respondents said they registered the death just because it was required by law.
The paper, Prevalence and determinants of death registration across three demographic surveillance sites in Kenya, is published in BMC Medicine.
The team said the findings show that formal registration remains low even when deaths have already been reported to the authorities and burial permits issued.
They described the gap between notification and registration as a structural problem in the civil registration system.
“Without deliberate efforts to reduce structural, financial, and informational barriers, Kenya’s CRVS (Civil Registration and Vital Statistics) system will continue to systematically undercount the deaths of vulnerable populations including the poorest, youngest, and most marginalised, precisely those most in need of policy visibility,” they said.
The team found that deaths among infants below one year were much less likely to be registered than deaths among people aged 65 to 84. The same pattern was found among children aged one to four and those aged five to 17.
The researchers also point to earlier research suggesting that cultural taboos around announcing some infant deaths may contribute to under-registration.
However, only a small proportion of respondents in this study specifically cited cultural or religious beliefs as a reason for not registering a death.
Deaths of unmarried people were also less likely to be registered than those among married people. The jobless were less likely to have their deaths registered than self-employed people.
“Widespread information and advocacy campaigns on the importance of timely death registration, particularly of children’s deaths, are called for with a targeted emphasis on the poor, unemployed and those in rural and peri-urban communities. It is necessary to audit the working of civil registration service points, increase their number and bring them closer to the people to ensure equity,” the authors said.
The others are James Bukosia, Isaac Waluke, Peter Sifuna, Kenedy Omolo, Amek Nyaguara, Vincent Were, Mike Rajwayi, Barack Mwanzia, Sharon A. Onyango, Emily Odipo, Viola Chepkurui, Christopher Nyundo, Joseph Kamau, Stéphane Helleringer, Robert W. Snow and Emelda A. Okiro.
The team found that failure to register a death was not always a deliberate decision to ignore the law.
Many families faced practical barriers, including lack of awareness, costs and the distance to registration offices.
Lack of awareness that registration was required was reported in 18.7 per cent of unregistered deaths. Cost was cited in 17.8 per cent of cases, while 17.6 per cent of respondents said they did not believe registration offered any benefit.
Section 8 of the Births and Deaths Registration Act (Cap 149) says a registrar shall not register a death after six months from the date of death, unless the Principal Registrar gives written authority and the prescribed fee is paid.
The registration to obtain a death certificate is Sh200 while late registration attracts an additional Sh500 penalty.
About 14.6 per cent cited the complexity of the process, while 10.7 per cent said registration points were too far away. Missing documents accounted for seven per cent of responses, while four per cent cited cultural or religious beliefs.
Only 0.6 per cent said the deceased was too young to be registered.
The researchers proposed using digital systems to make registration easier.
“Requiring individuals to make a second visit to a service point after notification to initiate registration is a constraint in the civil registration process. Digital automation, which could make death registration a one-step process, could address this challenge,” they said.
The Kenya National Bureau of Statistics records indicate most Kenyans never complete death registration anyway.
The Kenya Vital Statistics Report 2024, published in 2025 put death registration completeness at 44.8 per cent in 2024, down from 45.1 per cent in 2023 and 52.3 per cent in 2021.
Uasin Gishu had the highest death registration completeness at 91.5 per cent, while Mandera had the lowest at 6.8 per cent.
