Global Burden of Disease Study 2013

The Global Burden of Disease estimates age-sex specific all-cause mortality and cause-specific mortality, and the life-years lost.

Please read the paper for the methods:

GBD 2013 Mortality and Causes of Death Collaborators "Global, regional and national age-sex specific all-cause and cause-specific mortality for 240 causes of death, 1990-2013: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease." Lancet 2015; 385:117-71

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"Ischaemic heart disease and stroke were important contributors to the risk of death in middle age, and were greater for men than for women"

The top five causes of years of life lost (YLL) in the Middle East and North African region were ischaemic heart disease, preterm birth complications, congenital disorders, stroke and road injuries. Each of these causes appeared in all of the top ten causes for each individual country in the region. Besides ischaemic heart disease, non communicable diseases contributed significantly to life years lost. Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and diabetes were the seventh and eighth highest causes of YLL in the region and affected the majority of the countries. Lung cancer, breast cancer, stomach cancer, hypertensive heart disease, "other cardiovascular diseases" and chronic kidney disease all appeared in the individual top ten causes for YLL for at least one country. In Syria, war was the leading cause of life years lost, a tragic reflection of the ongoing conflict.

"In North Africa & the Middle east, transport injuries and ischaemic heart disease were predominant. For women in the region, breast cancer in all countries and maternal mortality in Sudan & Yemen were also major factors"

In general, the authors note that age-standardised deaths for cardiovascular and circulatory diseases have fallen in both high-income and many middle-income countries. They note that although cancer deaths have increased, the age-standardised death rates have fallen. Smoking rates have declined but obesity rates have increased - this can also be observed in the data collected for the MEDCHAMPs paper on CVD risk factor trends in Palestine, Syria, Tunisia and Turkey. 

The paper also stresses the importance of health monitoring to inform public policy, and to increase the speed of the data collection process