[ti:The Ups and Downs of Living Longer] [ar:] [al:Health Report] [by:www.51voa.com] [00:00.00]From VOA Learning English, [00:02.48]this is the Health Report in Special English. [00:06.47]A new study says people are living longer, [00:10.27]but many are living longer in poor health. [00:14.79]Researchers found that life expectancy has increased [00:19.33]by about five years since 1990. [00:23.40]On average, men worldwide [00:26.26]can expect to live 67 and a half years. [00:30.85]Women can expect to live to age 73. [00:35.07]Almost 500 researchers in 50 countries [00:39.81]took part in the study of global disease and disability. [00:45.03]The findings appear in a series of articles in the Lancet. [00:50.39]Richard Horton is the medical journal's editor-in-chief. [00:54.98]"All of us in the world of health [00:57.04]focus on diseases and often bad news. [01:00.96]Actually, the Global Burden of Disease 2010 Study [01:03.79]broadly presents very good news." [01:06.36]The research found that far fewer people [01:10.05]died of measles, tetanus, respiratory problems [01:14.52]and diarrheal diseases in 2010 than in 1990. [01:20.48]Deaths from infections, childbirth-related problems [01:25.26]and malnutrition fell about 17 percent to 13.2 million. [01:33.41]Global efforts have focused on reducing HIV/AIDS, [01:38.89]tuberculosis and malaria. [01:41.81]HIV/AIDS deaths have dropped since 2006, [01:47.44]and TB deaths fell almost 20 percent since 1990. [01:53.67]But each of these diseases still kills [01:57.33]more than a million people every year. [02:00.51]The number of malaria deaths increased [02:04.08]by an estimated 20 percent, to almost 1.2 million in 2010. [02:11.60]"Those three big, big diseases are not just going to go away." [02:15.37]Mike Cohen is the head of global health research [02:18.99]at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. [02:22.87]He was not involved in the research, [02:25.58]but says it shows a change taking place worldwide. [02:30.66]"As infectious diseases have been better controlled [02:33.73]and people live longer, [02:34.64]and as their diets change and lifestyles change, [02:37.65]the inevitable consequence in health is, [02:39.61]you have to deal much more broadly with hypertension, [02:43.15]heart disease, diabetes." [02:44.55]The study found that these kinds of non-communicable diseases [02:49.18]caused more than half of the global burden of disease in 2010. [02:55.07]The two biggest killers -- heart disease and stroke [02:59.29]-- caused one-fourth of all deaths in 2010. [03:03.87]That was up from one-fifth in 1990. [03:08.08]There was a 48 percent increase in the number of deaths [03:13.01]from lung cancer, which is commonly caused by smoking tobacco. [03:18.53]The top causes of disability in 2010 [03:22.41]were physical conditions like arthritis and back problems, [03:27.14]and mental and behavioral problems like depression, [03:32.03]anxiety and substance abuse. [03:35.54]Harvard University professor Joshua Salomon [03:39.41]was a co-author of the disability research. [03:43.14]"I think in general we've been more successful [03:45.44]at reducing mortality and less successful [03:48.82]at actually addressing chronic disability."