Infographic: Burden of Disease in SA

The South African Medical Research Council (SAMRC) presented the findings of its national burden of disease study for 1997 to 2010 to the Select Committee on Social Services on Tuesday, 16 March 2016. The findings outlined the leading causes of deaths and mortality estimates.

There had been a nine-year increase in average life expectancy since 2005, and this could be attributed to the provision of antiretrovirals (ARVs). The life expectancy of males (60 years) was lower than that of females (65 to 66 years), because males recorded higher incidences of smoking, alcohol use and injuries. Cardiovascular disease had been the leading cause of death prior to 1999, but has since been overtaken by HIV/AIDS and Tuberculosis (TB). All cancers were responsible for an estimated 7% of deaths in 2010.

The study highlighted the following:

• HIV/AIDS, Cerebrovascular disease, lower respiratory infections and TB were the four leading causes of death in 2010

• The premature adult mortality rate (the probability of dying between the ages of 15 and 60 years of age) is 34% - a decrease of 16% since 2005

• The under-5, infant and neonatal mortality levels had leveled out at 40, 28 and 11 deaths per 1 000 live births respectively between 2011 and 2014

• There was uncertainty around the true values on maternal mortality rates, but estimates showed a decline from 300 deaths in 2010 to approximately 155 deaths per 100 000 live births in 2013

• The leading cause of death in children was still HIV/AIDS (28%)

• The average national under-5 mortality rate is 51.8 per 1 000 live births with KwaZulu-Natal recording the most (66) deaths

Access meeting report here and see infographic below more statistics on the burden of health and disease in South Africa: