'Lifestyle diseases increasing in India'

Metabolic risk factors responsible for 5.2 million premature deaths

Lifestyle diseases have replaced traditional health risk factors resulting in an increase in incidents of disease and deaths in India in the last two decades, suggests a new research.

Most diseases and deaths are now caused by high cholesterol, high blood pressure, obesity, alcohol use and poor diet.

Old-generation risk factors like unsafe water, sanitation and child malnutrition don’t cause much sickness now, compared to what used to be the case 30 years ago.
This, however, does not mean Indians are not falling ill due to poor quality water and lack of nutrition.

However, the relative importance of these diseases in public health reduced in India, suggests the study that analysed 79 risk factors from 188 nations.

“The contribution of metabolic risk factors such as high blood pressure, blood sugar and cholesterol and that of poor diet and alcohol use to health loss has doubled in India over the past quarter of a century. On the other hand, the contribution of unsafe water and sanitation, and child and maternal under-nutrition has halved,” said Lalit Dandona, distinguished research professor at the Public Health Foundation of India (PHFI).

Even with 50 per cent drop in figures, the number is still fairly large in India because of its population base. Parallel to this, air pollution and tobacco smoking continue to be two major contributors of health loss in India.

Pointers
 “The findings provide useful pointers to where policies should emphasise to improve health in India,” said Dandona.

High cholesterol, blood pressure and body-mass-index (a mark of obesity) alcohol use and sodium-rich diet triggered more deaths in 2013 compared to the 1990.
“Metabolic risk factors like high blood pressure, blood sugar and cholesterol, along with unhealthy diets and smoking are responsible for about 5.2 million premature deaths in India every year,” said K Srinath Reddy, PHFI president.

The good news is fewer women are encountering health problems on account of iron deficiency, unsafe sanitation and water .

“Since 1990, improvements in unsafe water sources have reduced their contribution to the disease burden. But they continue to be significant contributors to ill health,” said Soumya Swaminathan, director general of the Indian Council of Medical Research.