Pollution, smoking, roads, obesity kill 4.7m Chinese a year
Paris (AFP) - Air pollution,
smoking, obesity and accidents, especially on the road, kill at least
4.7 million Chinese a year and cost the country tens of billions of
dollars, researchers said on Friday.
In an overview
published in The Lancet, they said China had in some respects made
great strides in health, boosting the average lifespan from 40 years in
1950 to 76 years in 2011 and rolling back many infectious diseases.
On
the other hand, the risk of premature death and sickness from
pollution, smoking, road crashes and "lifestyle" ailments is worse than
before.
The trio of Chinese
and US experts said China had the chance of learning from rich countries
which had already been down this path, a by-product of rising
prosperity.
"Many of these risks can be lowered by interventions with shown effectiveness," they said.
"China
has the opportunity to avoid repetition of the full toll of preventable
disease burdens suffered by high-income countries from non-communicable
diseases."
The research, led
by Jeffrey Koplan, a professor at Emory University in Atlanta, provides
the following snapshot, which includes figures that have been published
previously:
-- Air pollution: A million deaths annually are
attributable to inhaling indoor smoke from solid fuels, and another 1.2
million from inhaling fine particulate matter outdoors.
The
economic cost from particulate air pollution among urban dwellers was
341 billion yuan ($55 billion, 42 billion euros) in 2006, according to
the paper.
-- Smoking: 1.4 million premature deaths each year, costing 41 billion yuan annually on the basis of values for 2000.
--
Road fatalities: China has more than 800,000 deaths annually from
accidents, which are "mainly" accounted for by road accidents, according
to the report. (Separately, the United Nations estimated 275,000 road
deaths in China in 2010).
Accidents of all kinds are the leading
cause of death in the 1-39 age group and cost 65 billion yuan in medical
expenses alone, said the study.
--
Obesity: 363,000 fatalities each year attributable to high body-mass
index, a condition linked to heart disease, diabetes and other ailments.
The cost -- in 2003 -- was 21 billion yuan.
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