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The burden of disease

On 28 October 2005, the Health Protection Agency (HPA) published a report (Health protection in the 21st century: understanding the burden of disease: preparing for the future) which builds on work which has quantified the burden of infectious diseases (an annual treatment cost of approximately £6 billion) applying the same principles to assessing the burden of non-infectious diseases associated with radiation, chemicals, poisons and pollution.

The report is a first stage in the process of quantifying the totality of the burden of disease, particularly in the area of environmentally linked non-infectious disease.

Findings include:

• Exposure to ultraviolet radiation (UVR) causes skin cancers; with an estimated 7,000 new cases of malignant melanoma diagnosed in the UK each year
• The cost of poisoning to the NHS alone is approximately £110 million, excluding the cost of emergency department attendances.

The study shows that the greatest burden from non-infectious diseases associated with environmental threats will be long term chronic disease. This will impact most on the primary care sector and the wider community. However the actual cost is still largely unknown.

The full report can be viewed on the HPA website (pdf).