Vietnam sees high mortality rate of non-communicable diseases

From Bernama

HANOI — The mortality rate of non-communicable diseases in Vietnam is four times higher than that of infectious diseases, accounting for 67.34 percent of deaths from diseases, according to the Ministry of Health.

The ministry’s statistics for 2011 also showed that the morbidity rate from non-communicable diseases was 62.72 percent or 2.4 times higher than that from infectious diseases at 25.89 percent, reports Vietnam News Agency (VNA).

Vietnam has given priority to five groups of non-communicable diseases, namely cardiovascular, cancer, diabetes, chronic respiration and mental disorders. They have been in the national target programme on healthcare since 1999.

Deputy Minister of Health Nguyen Thi Xuyen said all countries in the world are facing increasing morbidity rates of non-communicable diseases, people are able to prevent risk factors of the diseases by maintaining a healthy lifestyle.

Read the full story from Bernama.