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From the executive summary of Capitalizing on the Demographic Transition: Tackling Noncommunicable Diseasesin South Asia:
‘The goal of this book is to encourage countries to develop, adopt, and implement effective and timely country and, where appropriate, regional responses that reduce both population-level risk factors and the noncommunicable disease burden.. . .This book looks primarily at cardiovascular disease (CVD) and tobacco use since they account for a disproportionate amount of the NCD burden—the focus is strategic, rather than comprehensive.’
Full text is at http://siteresources.worldbank.org/SOUTHASIAEXT/Resources/223546-1296680097256/7707437-1296680114157/NCDs_South_Asia_February_2011.pdf
One finds in many developing countries a tendency to place noncommunicable diseases on the back burner, even when, as with tobacco, the control measures are cheap and simple. If the communicable disease programmes of these countries succeed, where will today’s birth cohorts be in 20 or 30 years, unprotected from risks which were considered low priority in 2011?