WHO – Unhealthy Lifestyles to Kill 52 Million Yearly By 2030

The Citizen (Dar es Salaam)

Syriacus Buguzi

4 June 2011

This year’s rush for the cupful of a herbal concoction offered by the Rev Ambilikile Mwasapila of Samunge Village in Loliondo by those expecting a miraculous cure is a good testimony of the big health challenge facing the country, and perhaps most developing nations.The unprecedented rush has ensued following Rev Mwasapila’s claim that his concoction provides cure for chronic diseases such as cancer, diabetes, hypertension and HIV/Aids.

According to a recent World Health Organisation’s (WHO) report, chronic diseases, most of which are to do with unhealthy and ethically wanting lifestyles, will claim 52 million lives each year globally by 2030.

As unhealthy lifestyles go unabated and most funds being injected into infectious disease control, greater tolls are predicted to occur in developing nations amid warning by public health experts of an imminent global epidemic of non-communicable diseases (NCDs).

In the report released this April in Moscow, WHO says that more deaths from chronic non-communicable diseases will occur in economically less privileged countries in the next 20 years. That is contrary to the wildly held belief that these were diseases for the affluent societies.

According to the world’s health watchdog survey, non-communicable diseases were responsible for 63 per cent of deaths worldwide in 2008, a proportion equal to 36.1 million people, with nearly 80 per cent of the deaths occurring in low- and middle-income countries. The identified major killer conditions were heart diseases, strokes, chronic lung diseases, cancers and diabetes.

Tanzania is also being threatened by the imminent public health crisis, which experts associate with lifestyles, levels of income, eating habits and education. The threat is not only confined to the rich living in urban areas, but also the poor living in remote parts of the country.

In a survey undertaken in Iringa Region’s Kilolo District four years ago, it was found out that the prevalence of alcohol consumption was 71 per cent, and tobacco smoking six per cent. The survey by the ministry of Health and Social Welfare, the National Institute for Medical Research and Tanzania Food and Nutrition Centre, involving a sample of 383 aged 25-64, was done a year before WHO undertook the 2008 global evaluation of chronic diseases.

Other findings of the survey in Iringa showed that the overall prevalence of hypertension among men and women was 36 per cent, and the levels of cholesterol, a fatty substance known to cause heart disease, were close to the upper limits.

The level of education was found to be a decisive factor in influencing lifestyles and suffering from certain diseases and alcohol consumption. Those having secondary school and above were more hypertensive, while those with lower than class seven education consumed more alcohol.

The risk factors noted in Kilolo are all listed in the WHO report, which identifies the big four potential root causes for the imminent epidemic of NCDs in the world by 2030. The four are tobacco use followed by physical inactivity, then the harmful use of alcohol and lastly poor diets.

In the report, WHO ranks cardiovascular diseases as the most deadly NCDs that account for 17 million deaths annually, followed by cancer (7.6 million), respiratory diseases (4.2 million), and diabetes (1.3 million).

Describing the NCDs scenario as a two-punch blow to development, WHO director general Margaret Chan said: “They (the diseases) cause billions of dollars in losses of national incomes, and they push millions of people below the poverty line, each and every year. For some countries, it is no exaggeration to describe the situation as an impending disaster; a disaster for health, for society, and most of all for national economies”.

The action plan to deal with the problem provides a roadmap for taking action against NCDs, including raising the priority of NCD control, improving disease surveillance and enabling governments to take comprehensive action against the diseases.

According to the Tanzania Food and Nutrition Centre (TFNC), the riskiest group to suffer from NCDs in the country are people aged 15 – 59 who live in urban areas. Obesity, which unfortunately to some societies is a symbol of wealth and status, is increasingly becoming a serious health problem not only globally but also in the country.

People are unknowingly jeopardising their lives by preferring to feed on fattening diets that make them exceed medically approved weights of Body Mass Index (BMI) of 18.5kg – 25kg per square meter. The above condition is a known risk factor for a number of diseases, which are burdening public health care delivery services that are already over-stretched in most poor economies and developing countries.

Take stroke and coronary heart diseases for example, or rheumatic heart diseases, which are among the leading causes of death and important factors contributing to disability. Or consider the situation of women battling in agony with cancer of the cervix, uterine fibroids and breast cancer. Also consider men with lung and prostate cancers. It’s appalling indeed!

Many an expert have concluded and recommended that similar efforts being directed at combating infectious diseases should also go for NCDs since the latter is also a menacing public health issue. Many studies and reports have already proved beyond reasonable doubt that NDCs are not ailments of the rich but for all segments of society, which require concerted efforts from all quarters to deal with.

The author is a medical student at the Muhimbili University College of Health Sciences and a freelance journalist.

AllAfrica – All the Time