Disability-Adjusted Life Years for Communicable Disease in the Korean Burden of Disease Study 2012

Lee, Ye-Rin; Moon, Kanghee; Kim, Young Ae; Park, So-Youn; Oh, Chang-Mo; Lee, Kyung-Suk; Oh, In-Hwan

Measuring the burden of disease allows for the rational allocation of limited health care resources (1) . An indicator of the burden of disease, disability-adjusted life years (DALY), is a combination of years of life lost (YLL) and years lived with disability (YLD) (2) . According to the Global burden of disease (GBD) group, the proportion of DALYs for communicable diseases decreased in Korea from 1990 (9.29%) to 2010 (6.48%). Globally, the proportion of DALYs for communicable disease also decreased from 1990 (46.9%) to 2010 (33.5%) (3) . Experts have predicted that the DALYs of communicable disease will decrease globally to 20% in 2030. But the volume of DALYs due to communicable diseases will decrease in developing countries, the volume in high-income countries will remain similar to the present level (4) . A 2010 GBD study reported that the proportion of DALYs from communicable diseases in developing countries decreased from 53.7% in 1990 to 38.7% in 2010; however, in highincome regions the reduction was much less, from 7.4% in 1990 to 5.7% in 2010 (3) . The communicable disease would be still substantial burden in the future.