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Background: As Indonesia moves to provide health coverage for all citizens, understanding patterns of morbidity and mortality is important to allocate resources and address inequality. The Global Burden of Disease 2016 study (GBD 2016) estimates sources of early death and disability, which can inform policies to improve health care.Methods: We used GBD 2016 results for cause-specific deaths, years of life lost, years lived with disability, disability-adjusted life-years (DALYs), life expectancy at birth, healthy life expectancy, and risk factors for 333 causes in Indonesia and in seven comparator countries. Estimates were produced by location, year, age, and sex using methods outlined in GBD 2016. Using the Socio-demographic Index, we generated expected values for each metric and compared these against observed results.Findings: In Indonesia between 1990 and 2016, life expectancy increased by 8·0 years (95% uncertainty interval [UI] 7·3-8·8) to 71·7 years (71·0-72·3): the increase was 7·4 years (6·4-8·6) for males and 8·7 years (7·8-9·5) for females. Total DALYs due to communicable, maternal, neonatal, and nutritional causes decreased by 58·6% (95% UI 55·6-61·6), from 43·8 million (95% UI 41·4-46·5) to 18·1 million (16·8-19·6), whereas total DALYs from non-communicable diseases rose. DALYs due to injuries decreased, both in crude rates and in age-standardised rates. The three leading causes of DALYs in 2016 were ischaemic heart disease, cerebrovascular disease, and diabetes. Dietary risks were a leading contributor to the DALY burden, accounting for 13·6% (11·8-15·4) of DALYs in 2016.Interpretation: Over the past 27 years, health across many indicators has improved in Indonesia. Improvements are partly offset by rising deaths and a growing burden of non-communicable diseases. To maintain and increase health gains, further work is needed to identify successful interventions and improve health equity.Funding: The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Japan has entered the era of super-ageing and advanced health transition, which is increasingly putting pressure on the sustainability of its health system. The level and pace of this health transition might vary across regions within Japan and concern is growing about increasing regional variations in disease burden. The Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study 2015 (GBD 2015) provides a comprehensive, comparable framework. We used data from GBD 2015 with the aim to quantify the burden of disease and injuries, and to attribute risk factors in Japan at a subnational, prefecture-level.Methods: We used data from GBD 2015 for 315 causes and 79 risk factors of death, disease, and injury incidence and prevalence to measure the burden of diseases and injuries in Japan and in the 47 Japanese prefectures from 1990 to 2015. We extracted data from GBD 2015 to assess mortality, causes of death, years of life lost (YLLs), years lived with disability (YLDs), disability-adjusted life-years (DALYs), life expectancy, and healthy life expectancy (HALE) in Japan and its 47 prefectures. We split extracted data by prefecture and applied GBD methods to generate estimates of burden, and attributable burden due to known risk factors. We examined the prefecture-level relationships of common health system inputs (eg, health expenditure and workforces) to the GBD outputs in 2015 to address underlying determinants of regional health variations.Findings: Life expectancy at birth in Japan increased by 4·2 years from 79·0 years (95% uncertainty interval [UI] 79·0 to 79·0) to 83·2 years (83·1 to 83·2) between 1990 and 2015. However, the gaps between prefectures with the lowest and highest life expectancies and HALE have widened, from 2·5 to 3·1 years and from 2·3 to 2·7 years, respectively, from 1990 to 2015. Although overall age-standardised death rates decreased by 29·0% (28·7 to 29·3) from 1990 to 2015, the rates of mortality decline in this period substantially varied across the prefectures, ranging from -32·4% (-34·8 to -30·0) to -22·0% (-20·4 to -20·1). During the same time period, the rate of age-standardised DALYs was reduced overall by 19·8% (17·9 to 22·0). The reduction in rates of age-standardised YLDs was very small by 3·5% (2·6 to 4·3). The pace of reduction in mortality and DALYs in many leading causes has largely levelled off since 2005. Known risk factors accounted for 34·5% (32·4 to 36·9) of DALYs; the two leading behavioural risk factors were unhealthy diets and tobacco smoking in 2015. The common health system inputs were not associated with age-standardised death and DALY rates in 2015.Interpretation: Japan has been successful overall in reducing mortality and disability from most major diseases. However, progress has slowed down and health variations between prefectures is growing. In view of the limited association between the prefecture-level health system inputs and health outcomes, the potential sources of regional variations, including subnational health system performance, urgently need assessment.Funding: Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Japan Ministry of Education, Science, Sports and Culture, Japan Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, AXA CR Fixed Income Fund and AXA Research Fund. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses a study which examined global trends in neonatal, infant and under-5 mortality from 1990 to 2013. Topics discussed include a reduction in child mortality rate, an increase in the number of child births in 2013 as compared to 1990, and developing countries expected to achieve the Millennium Development Goal 4 (MDG 4).