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GENEVA, Switzerland – Noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) accounted for seven of the top 10 causes of death before the coronavirus pandemic, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Dec. 9, and heart disease kills more people never.
The new WHO World Health Estimates, which added 2019 data to statistics dating back to 2000, found that people lived longer lives, but those extra years weren’t necessarily lived in good health.
The study, which outlines the trends of the past two decades in mortality and morbidity caused by disease and injury, showed that NCDs made up just four of the top 10 causes of death in 2000, rising to seven last year.
COVID-19 is likely to be in the top 10 of 2020, WHO officials said, and the death toll surpassed the 1.5 million mark on December 3.
In 2019, around 55.4 million deaths were recorded worldwide.
10 leading causes of death
The top 10 causes of death accounted for 55 percent of those deaths. They are divided into three broad categories: cardiovascular, respiratory, and neonatal.
The top five causes of death, in order, were heart disease; strokes chronic obstructive pulmonary disease; lower respiratory tract infections; and neonatal conditions.
Heart disease
The figures “clearly highlight the need for an intensified global approach to prevent and treat cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes and chronic respiratory diseases, as well as address injuries,” WHO said in a statement.
Heart disease has been the leading cause of death in the world for the past 20 years.
“However, it is now killing more people than ever,” the WHO said, with nine million deaths in 2019, two million more than in 2000.
Heart disease accounts for 16 percent of all deaths from all causes, with strokes for 11 percent and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease for six percent.
Diabetes
Diabetes has been included in the top 10 causes of death after a 70 percent increase in the number of deaths since 2000.
Bente Mikkelsen, head of ENT at the WHO, said that although insulin was discovered almost 100 years ago, less than half of the people who need it have access to it.
“There is an urgency to act,” he said.
Increase taxes on tobacco and beverages
Mikkelsen said that the most efficient way to protect people against risk factors for NCDs was to “increase the tax on tobacco and sugary drinks” and other unhealthy products.
“It is also a very important way to increase health budgets.”
NCDs together accounted for 74 percent of deaths globally in 2019. “We need to rapidly accelerate the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of NCDs,” said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
HIV / AIDS, tuberculosis decrease
HIV / AIDS rose from the eighth leading cause of death in 2000 to the 19th leading cause of death in 2019. However, it remains fourth in Africa, even as the number of deaths on the continent fell from more than one million to 435,000 in the 20s. year span.
Tuberculosis has also fallen from the world’s top 10, from seventh in 2000 to 13th last year, thanks to a 30 percent reduction in global deaths.
The new estimates found that in low-income countries, communicable diseases took a higher toll, accounting for six of the top 10 causes of death, including malaria (sixth), tuberculosis (eighth) and HIV / AIDS (ninth). ).
The average life expectancy
The global average life expectancy was over 73 years in 2019, compared to almost 67 in 2000, with the greatest gains in less developed regions.
However, Bochen Cao of the WHO data and analytics department cautioned that healthy life expectancy was not increasing at the same rate.
The global alliance NCD Alliance said the report described a “devastating cost” in human lives that could have been avoided.
Governments must invest better in health, promote healthy lives and combat risk factors, said CEO Katie Dain. The sudden rise in diabetes is a “tragic illustration” of the inability to do so and is “clearly unsustainable in the future,” he said.
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