A new Lancet report sets a global goal of halving the risk of premature death health news

They explained that a person born in 2019 had a 31% chance of dying before turning 70. If the 50 by 50 target is achieved globally, a person born in 2050 can expect to have a 15% chance of dying before age 70, they say.

The authors say the seven countries could be at the beginning of the path to achieving full universal health coverage, reducing the likelihood of premature death.

To achieve the 50-50 goal, tobacco control with taxation is the most important policy a government can adopt, given tobacco-related deaths and the government's established capacity to implement tobacco policy, the group said.

According to a study led by Harvard University and published in the British Medical Journal in April 2023, among other factors, the consumption of sugary drinks increases the risk of early death and heart disease in people with type 2 diabetes.

With regard to the exceptionally high mortality risk due to epidemics, the authors attribute the success of the best-performing countries, such as China and Japan, to the national implementation of basic public health principles – including early intervention, isolation and quarantine, and financial support.

As part of an approach focused on strengthening health systems, the authors propose a range of interventions that they say could be cost-effective and feasible to implement in high-, middle- and low-income countries.

They argued that increasing investment and services for just 15 priority health conditions—eight communicable and maternal health conditions and seven noncommunicable diseases and injury-related conditions—could reduce premature deaths by 50 percent by mid-century. Countries are choosing to do this.

The decrease in deaths caused by these 15 conditions was fundamental to the increase in life expectancy between 2000 and 2019, the authors said.

However, interventions that address these 15 conditions remain inaccessible to millions of people, they said, and attributed the lack of attention to the high-priority primary measures of universal health coverage.

Other fiscal policies, including taxing unhealthy foods and drinks and eliminating fossil fuel subsidies, would directly benefit health and generate revenue that could be invested in health services, the authors say.

“The 50 by 50 target, with an interim benchmark of a 30 percent reduction in the chance of premature death by 2035, remains within reach,” the authors wrote.

“The most effective route is to focus resources on a narrow set of conditions and increase funding to develop and implement new health technologies.

“Our analyzes show that the economic value of achievable mortality reductions is high and often a significant fraction of the value of the gains from economic growth,” the authors wrote.