Alarm over indigenous killer diseases risks
NEW data revealing the dire state of health among indigenous people has backed up what many in the Far North have been saying for a long time.
The Causes of Death data for last year, released this week by the Australian Bureau of Statistics, showed indigenous people were succumbing to preventable diseases much more often than their non-indigenous neighbours.
Topping the list, indigenous people were more than twice as likely to die from the country’s biggest killer, ischaemic heart disease.
They were about five times more likely to die from diabetes, and about twice as likely to die from lower respiratory diseases.
Apunipima Cape York Health Council public health medical adviser Mark Wenitong said there didn’t need to be such a disparity between indigenous and non-indigenous health outcomes.
“The big issue is that these are preventable diseases that we know can be dealt with best at primary health care level with appropriate prevention and health promotion programs,” Dr Wenitong said. “That’s comprehensive primary health care which the Aboriginal Community Controlled Health sector deliver when funded appropriately.”
Indigenous people were also more than twice as likely to take their own life, four times as likely to die from cirrhosis and other diseases of the liver and three times as likely to die in land vehicle accidents.