The Health Challenge Chronic Degenerative Diseases

The world’s most destructive diseases today are not those caused by viruses and germs. They are degenerative diseases – which result from accumulated damage and degeneration of our cells.

There is yet no effective cure...
In its annual report, the World Health Organization warns that cancer, heart disease and other chronic conditions, which already killed more than 24 million people a year, will impose increasing burden of suffering and disability in hundreds of millions of others.

…but degenerative diseases can be prevented
Many people still think of chronic diseases as unfortunate, but inevitable results of old age. We now know that “old” does not equal “sick”. Balanced nutrition, physical activity and a healthy lifestyle give us an excellent chance of avoiding degenerative diseases.


8 Deadly Diseases
The World Health Organization warns that cancer, heart disease and other chronic conditions, which already kill more than 24 million people a year, will impose increasing burdens of suffering and disability on hundreds of millions of others. These are the public health enemies throughout the modern world.

1: Heart Disease
2: Cancer
3: Stroke
4: Diabetes
5: Osteoporosis
6: Arthritis
7: Alzheimer
8: Obesity

As an addition, we did some search and found this short article which we would like to share with our readers:

Chronic and degenerative disease: major causes of morbidity and death
R Doll
Imperial Cancer Research Fund Cancer Studies Unit, Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford, United Kingdom.

In OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) countries (Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, and United States), mortality at ages 35-69 y has fallen by 38% since 1955 and the risk of dying before age 70 y has been reduced to 23%.

In middle and old age, chronic and degenerative diseases are the principal causes of death. Neoplasms, ischemic heart disease, and cerebrovascular disease cause three-quarters of all deaths at 35-69 y of age and two-thirds at older ages. Mortality from vascular disease has declined rapidly. Mortality from neoplasms has not declined rapidly; however, mortality not attributed to smoking has and there is no general increase in cancer attributable to industrial development. Despite lower death rates in nonsmokers than in cigarette smokers, vascular disease and neoplasms remain the targets for prevention.

With increased duration of life, conditions that cause serious disability in old age become more important and the principal foci for research. These conditions are also chronic and degenerative.

Are You a Likely Victim?
We are going to explore and try to answer this question in our next post. As for now don’t forget to subscribe to our feeds to ensure that you won’t miss any of our future posts. Please join us in the discussion by writing your comments here.