Public health is an important indicator of the socio-economic development of the state. Its monitoring is necessary and is carried out nowadays for different purposes. The possibility of assessing changes in public health over time, and its dynamics in different regions of the country, compared with other countries, provides a scientific basis for the formation of state policy in this area. By now, sufficiently informative and unified indicators have been developed to assess public health. The key criteria for assessing the effectiveness of the medical system are mortality and morbidity indicators.
The morbidity indicator is a medical and statistical indicator that shows the level and frequency of all diseases taken together or each disease separately, first registered during a certain period of time among the population of a particular territory. Morbidity characterizes the frequency of new cases of disease among the population. The incidence rate of an infection is usually calculated per 100,000 of the population of both sexes and of all ages living in the territory where the cases are registered (Celentano, 2022). If the incidence rate is not high and the population is insignificant, it can be calculated per 10000.1000.100 population (Celentano, 2022). The significance of this indicator is high because it makes it possible to assess the prevalence of a particular disease and the epidemiological situation. Thus, the indicator of COVID-19 incidence in different regions has been most actively studied recently.
The mortality rate provides a picture of population loss and assesses a region’s social, demographic, and medical well-being. Since most causes of death differ significantly by age, standardized mortality rates improve comparability over time and between countries. The reason is that mortality rates can be measured regardless of the age structure of the population at different times and sex ratios tend to be more stable across countries. Mortality rates measure the effectiveness of a healthcare system in the context of a specific disease or social phenomenon. For example, the COVID-19 mortality rate allows us to track the age group that is more likely to die (Celentano, 2022). However, the morbidity indicator is more informative because it allows for predicting the prospects of change in the current situation and its consequences.
Of all causes of death in the United States, most are connected with different types of diseases. The top 10 accounts for 75% of all deaths. The top three causes account for more than 50% of all deaths in the country (Montez, 2022). The latest data shows that there are 2,515,458 deaths in the U.S. each year; of those, 1,254,978 are men and 1,260,480 are women (Montez, 2022). Risk factors vary by age, gender, and ethnic group and include depression and mental illness; alcohol or drug abuse; domestic violence; and exposure to suicidal behavior from others, such as family members, friends, or co-workers.
Analysis of the data shows that there are other causes of death in Ethiopia. Non-communicable diseases are the most popular, accounting for 52% of citizens’ deaths each year. According to a study conducted by the Ethiopian Ministry of Health in partnership with the World Health Organization (WHO), one in five Ethiopians dies prematurely, before age 70, due to non-communicable diseases (Alamerie, 2020). The most common is cancer, which is diagnosed twice as often in women as in men.
References
Alamerie, L. (2020). Shared frailty model: a determinant of under child mortality in Ethiopia. LAP LAMBERT Academic Publishing.
Celentano, D. D. (2022). Epidemiology. Independently published.
Montez, J. K. (2022). Educational attainment and adult mortality in the united states: a systematic analysis of functional form. Demography.
