The UN made a new rating of causes of mortality of the world's population

For decades, world leaders in the field of health have directed their efforts to combat infectious diseases: AIDS, tuberculosis, influenza. They insisted on vaccines, better treatment and other ways of fighting microbes that could get to anywhere in the world in a matter of hours.

Now they have compiled a new list of enemies of public health. This time it's not pathogens, but our bad habits: smoking, overeating, reluctance to engage in physical education.

Next week, the UN General Assembly will hold the first ever summit dedicated to chronic diseases: cancer, diabetes, heart and lung diseases. They account for almost two thirds of deaths (about 36 million). In the United States, for example, they kill almost 9 people out of 10.

These diseases have common risk factors, and many of them can be prevented.

The spread of chronic diseases, according to the World Health Organization.

In many countries, these ailments still remain ... Unrecognized. So, in Ethiopia until recently there was only one oncologist for more than 80 million people. Now there are four. There are almost no medicines (and even painkillers). A blatant case occurred with a two-year-old boy, Makos Bekele, who contracted leukemia. His father took him to Addis Ababa, received advice from the US and prescribed chemotherapy drugs from India, but the child died because the hospital did not have a separate ward to protect him from infections that infected other patients. The father, who founded the anti-cancer organization, will represent the quartet of Ethiopian oncologists at the summit.

As is usually the case with the UN, the main officials were unable to agree before the meeting, which will be discussed - about combating certain diseases or risk factors - as well as goals and timelines. Besides, the world economy is in turmoil, and finding money is not so easy. However, Sydney Smith of the University of North Carolina (USA), the head of the World Cardiology Federation, notes that most proposals cost nothing: "We are not talking about trying to find a new miracle cure. It's about changing behavior and cost-effective drugs like aspirin and common drugs designed to control blood pressure. "

The United Nations for the second time pays attention to health care. The previous summit in 2001 led to the creation of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, in which governments and private groups have pumped billions of dollars. But now even the richest nations are sitting without money; on private entrepreneurs, too little hope. For example, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has already announced that it will not support the new initiative due to the lack of sufficient investment in combating infectious diseases in poor countries. The Fund believes that now it is much more important.

Specialists do not agree with this. "The notion that cancer is a problem of rich countries is a mistake," says Eduardo Casap, president of the Union for International Control of Cancer Diseases, for example. "Most African countries desperately need cancer treatment," said Ala Alwan, Deputy Director General of the World Health Organization. "In addition, the region has the highest rates of stroke and pressure."

In Ghana, 23 million people are "abandoned" for service ... Two oncological centers; there are four oncologists and no cancer nurses in the country, emphasizes Allen Lichter, executive director of the American Society of Clinical Oncology.

Africa remains the only region in the world where infectious diseases, pregnancy complications and malnutrition still kill more people than non-infectious diseases.

According to WHO, in the world for stroke and cardiovascular ailments account for almost half of all deaths from noncommunicable diseases - 17 million cases in 2008. Next come cancer (7.6 million), respiratory diseases - for example, emphysema (4.2 million), diabetes (1.3 million). It should also be noted that most diabetics die from cardiovascular causes.

The UN decided to focus on general risk factors, that is , tobacco use, alcohol abuse, unhealthy diets, lack of physical activity and carcinogens in the environment.

The impact of these factors is not uniform.

Europe and North America eat too much and exercise too little; there are heart diseases and diabetes. Since the prevention and treatment of cancer in these regions has long been widely available, cancer is most common among oncological diseases, that is, the age-related forms of the disease. In Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, on the contrary, because of smoking, lung cancer predominates. It is Europe - the world leader in the prevalence of this harmful habit: 29% of the population smoke, smoke, smoke.

In Southeast Asia, the lowest level of obesity in the world. Nevertheless, in China, where only 6% of the population is obese, almost 4 out of 10 people have high blood pressure. In addition, deaths from respiratory diseases in China are four times higher than in the United States. In many regions, the rates of infection with the human papillomavirus are also high.

In India, the government has only recently embarked on a massive fight against diabetes and high blood pressure. In the country, 51 million diabetics are the second indicator after China. Indians have the most common form of oncology - lung cancer, in Indian women - cervical cancer.

In Central and South America, the picture of the spread of cancer largely resembles North America, with one exception: in some areas, cervical cancer dominates. The problem in specialists: in Honduras on 700 new cases per year there are only two oncologists.