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Cancer deaths, life expectancy both on the rise worldwide
The number of people who died of cancer worldwide increased by 38% from 1990 to 2010, according to data from the Global Burden of Disease 2010 study.
Nearly 67% of three deaths in 2010 were related to noncommunicable disease such as cancer, diabetes and heart disease, the data showed. That’s up from about 33% in 1990.
The data were published in one of seven papers about the Global Burden of Disease 2010 study, published in The Lancet.
“Our analyses, for the first time, allow such comparative assessments and are important inputs into discussions about goals and targets for the post-Millennium Development Goals era,” researcher Rafael Lozano, MD, professor of global health at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington, said in a press release.
In a second paper, researchers reported that the average man’s life expectancy increased 19.7% since 1970, while the average woman’s life expectancy increased 19.8%. The number of deaths in children aged younger than 5 years declined nearly 60% since 1970.
“Because more children are now surviving to adulthood compared to earlier decades, health policy makers globally will need to pay much more attention to preventing deaths in young adults aged 15-49 in coming years,” Haidong Wang, PhD, assistant professor of global health at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington, said in a press release.
However, despite these significant increases, the gap between the countries with the highest life expectancy and the countries with the lowest life expectancy has remained similar since 1970, about 32 to 47 years. Mortality shocks such as the 1994 Rwanda genocide were discounted for this analysis.
Among women, those who live in Japan had the highest life expectancy in the world at 85.9 years. Among men, those who live in Iceland had the highest life expectancy at 80 years. Haiti had the lowest life expectancy in 2010 for both men and women. The Maldives saw the greatest increase in overall life expectancy: 54.4% for men and 57.6% for women since 1970.
Countries that experienced gains in life expectancy of more than 20 years include Bangladesh, Bhutan, Iran and Peru. Since 1990, Angola, Ethiopia and Rwanda also saw substantial gains in life expectancy.
However, in southern sub-Saharan Africa, life expectancy decreased by 1.3 years for men and 0.9 years for women since 1990. The decline was mostly attributed to the HIV/AIDS epidemic.
In a third paper, researchers reported that overall life expectancy at birth increased by 4.7 years for men and 5.1 years for women from 1990 to 2010. But the number of years that people could expect to live in good health increased only by 3.9 years for men and 4 years for women.
“Health means more than simply delaying death or increasing life expectancy at birth,” Joshua Salomon, PhD, professor of global health at Harvard School of Public Health, said in a press release. “Although life expectancy is increasing globally, we need to understand whether or not people are living those extra years in good health.”
Women live longer in better health compared with men. Women in four countries had a healthy life expectancy of at least 70 years in 2010, but there were no such countries for men. Healthy life expectancy for women was higher than that of men in all but three countries.
There were few changes since 1990 in the rank of countries in order of healthy life expectancy at birth. Half of the countries that had the highest healthy life expectancies in 1990 remained in the top 10 for 2010. Most countries with the lowest healthy life expectancies were in sub-Saharan Africa. Afghanistan and Haiti were the only countries outside of Africa in the 10 countries with the lowest healthy life expectancies.
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Lozano R. Lancet. 2012;380:2095-2128.
Salomon J. Lancet. 2012;380:2144-2162.
Wang H. Lancet. 2012;380:2071-2094.