37% of women dying of suicide are Indians

37% of women dying of suicide are Indians

News:

1. A series of studies published in The Lancet reported that India has had witnessed an alarming rise in the occurrence of heart disease, stroke, diabetes, cancers and suicides over the past 25 years.

Important Facts:

1. The report titled “India State-level Disease Burden Initiative” has analysed several major Non Communicable Diseases (NCDs) and suicide cases for every state in India.
2. According to estimates, the prevalence of cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, chronic respiratory diseases, cancer, and suicide increased in all Indian states between 1990 and 2016

Non-Communicable Diseases:

3. Cardiovascular Diseases:

Prevalence of ischemic heart disease and stroke has increased by over 50% from 1990 to 2016 and contributed to 28% of total deaths (leading cause) in 2016

4. Chronic respiratory disease:

• Chronic respiratory diseases is the second leading factor for disease burden in India and were responsible for 10.9% of total death in 2016.
• The cases of COPD in India increased from 28 million to 55 million between 1990 and 2016. Further, the death rate among these cases is significantly higher in the less developed states than the more developed states.
• According to the study, contribution of air pollution to COPD was found to be higher than smoking. Air pollution has also been found to raise risk of cancer, cardiovascular diseases and diabetes prevalence.

5. Diabetes:

• Cases of diabetes rose by 29.7% between 1990 and 2016. It contributed to 3.1% of total deaths in 2016
• The prevalence of diabetes has been observed to be highest in the more developed states such as Tamil Nadu and Kerala and in New Delhi.

6. Cancer:

• The proportional contribution of cancers to the total health loss in India doubled from 1990 to 2016. However, the incidence of different types of cancers has been observed to vary widely across states.
• Cancers of the cervix, stomach and oesophagus reported a decline while breast and liver cancers have increased significantly

7. Suicides:

• According to the study, suicide is the leading cause of death in the age group 15-39 and there has been a 40% increase in the number of suicide deaths between 1990 and 2016
• India contributes 37% total global suicide deaths among women and the suicide rate among women in India is 2.1 times higher than the global average
• Suicide death rate among the elderly has also increased
• There are regional variations in suicide rates and Karnataka, Tamil Nadu; Andhra Pradesh recorded high suicide rates for both men and women.

Concerns:

• A major concern is very high rate of increase in the burden of cardiovascular diseases and diabetes in less developed states which already have a high burden from chronic obstructive lung disease and from a range of infectious and childhood diseases.
• Insufficient healthcare services and infrastructure in India makes it more difficult to combat the menace of rising disease burden in India

Way Forward:

• High suicide rates in India highlights the need for a national suicide prevention strategy which is data driven, gender specific and takes state variations into account
• There is an urgent need to address the double disease burden in less developed states with concerted efforts towards improving healthcare system, nutrition and public awareness.