Burden of disease
What you should know about this indicator
- Rationale: Mortality does not give a complete picture of the burden of disease borne by individuals in different populations. The overall burden of disease is assessed using the disability-adjusted life year (DALY), a time-based measure that combines years of life lost due to premature mortality (YLLs) and years of life lost due to time lived in states of less than full health, or years of healthy life lost due to disability (YLDs). One DALY represents the loss of the equivalent of one year of full health. Using DALYs, the burden of diseases that cause premature death but little disability (such as drowning or measles) can be compared to that of diseases that do not cause death but do cause disability (such as cataract causing blindness).
- Definition: DALYs expressed per 100 000 population. DALYs for a disease or health condition are the sum of the years of life lost to due to premature mortality (YLLs) and the years lived with a disability (YLDs) due to prevalent cases of the disease or health condition in a population.
- Method of estimation: DALYs expressed per 100 000 population. DALYs for a specific cause are calculated as the sum of the years of life lost due to premature mortality (YLLs) from that cause and the years of years of healthy life lost due to disability (YLDs) for people living in states of less than good health resulting from the specific cause. The YLLs for a cause are calculated as the number of cause-specific deaths multiplied by a loss function specifying the years lost for deaths as a function of the age at which death occurs. The loss function is based on the frontier national life expectancy projected for the year 2050 by the World Population Prospects 2012 (UN Population Division, 2013), with a life expectancy at birth of 92 years. Prevalence YLDs are used here. Prevalence YLDs are calculated as the prevalence of each non-fatal condition multiplied by its disability weight. More detailed method of estimation is available at: http://www.who.int/entity/healthinfo/statistics/GlobalDALYmethods_2000_2011.pdf?ua=1
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Citations
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To cite this page overall, including any descriptions, FAQs or explanations of the data authored by Our World in Data, please use the following citation:
“Data Page: Burden of disease”, part of the following publication: Esteban Ortiz-Ospina and Max Roser (2016) - “Global Health”. Data adapted from World Health Organization. Retrieved from https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/burden-of-disease-who [online resource]
How to cite this data
In-line citationIf you have limited space (e.g. in data visualizations), you can use this abbreviated in-line citation:
World Health Organization (2024) – with major processing by Our World in Data
Full citation
World Health Organization (2024) – with major processing by Our World in Data. “Burden of disease” [dataset]. World Health Organization, “Global Health Estimates” [original data]. Retrieved December 3, 2024 from https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/burden-of-disease-who