Heart disease is no longer the leading cause of death in rich countries, but it is cancer that could become the world's biggest killer in just a few decades if current trends continue, scientists have warned.
Publishing the findings of two major studies in the medical journal The Lancet, scientists said they had presented evidence of a new global "epidemiological transition" between different types of chronic diseases.
Cancer now kills twice as many people as heart disease in developed countries
While cardiovascular disease remains, for now, the leading cause of mortality worldwide among middle-aged people - accounting for about 40 percent of all deaths - this is no longer the case in high-income countries where cancer now kills twice as many people as heart disease, the study found. .
"Our work found that cancer was the second leading cause of death worldwide in 2017, accounting for 26 percent of all deaths. However, while rates (of heart disease) continue to fall, cancer could become the leading cause of death worldwide in just several decades," said Gilles Dagene, a professor at Laval University in Quebec, Canada.
Of about 55 million people who died in the world in 2017, scientists said, about 17,7 million died from cardiovascular diseases, reports Hina.
In the background of approximately 70 percent of these diseases are high blood pressure, high cholesterol, poor nutrition and smoking - factors that can be influenced.
In high-income countries, treating high cholesterol and blood pressure with drugs has helped reduce heart disease rates over the past few decades.
Degene's team said their findings suggest that the cause of higher death rates from heart disease in poorer countries may be lower quality health care.
Research has shown that rates of first hospitalization and use of drugs for heart disease are much lower in poorer and middle-income countries than in rich countries.
This research is part of the Urban and Rural Epidemiology (PURE) study, published in Lancet and presented at the ESC Congress in Paris.
Among the analyzed countries were Argentina, Bangladesh, Brazil, Chile, Philippines, India, Iran, South Africa, Canada, China, Colombia, Malaysia, Pakistan, Poland, Saudi Arabia, Sweden, Tanzania, Turkey, United Arab Emirates and Zimbabwe.
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