The World Health Organization (WHO) and the Chinese Ministry of Health opened a joint centre for controlling chronic diseases yesterday in Beijing.

The centre will be part of the Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and will focus on improving prevention measures against various chronic diseases in residential communities, officials said.

Chronic diseases, including cancer, diabetes and cardiovascular problems, caused 80 per cent of deaths in China from 1991 to 2000.

Lack of timely medical treatment and efficient prevention measures such as changing bad living habits and promoting public health education are the main reasons for the high levels of chronic diseases, experts said.

The purpose of such a centre is to gradually fill the gap between the high levels of disease and low capacity for prevention, said Wang Yu, director of CDC and the new centre.

The centre will collect and monitor the latest information on chronic diseases from around the country, he added.

Moreover, it will also demonstrate various prevention activities to local communities, such as the benefits of not smoking and of taking regular exercise. It will also spread the advanced disease control advice of the WHO, said Wang.

The WHO can gain experience from the centre and enhance co-operation with Chinese authorities and experts, said Henk Bekedam, WHO representative in China.

Among the 58 million deaths worldwide in 2005, 35 million were a result of various chronic diseases, according to WHO statistics.

A national survey in 2002 found that China had 160 million hypertension patients who were at risk from various heart and brain diseases.

However, nearly 70 per cent of them did not know they were suffering from the disease and were still leading unhealthy lifestyles, Kong Lingzhi, deputy director of the Disease Control Bureau of the Ministry of Health said.

Among the people who were aware that they were hypertension sufferers, only 6 percent have effectively controlled the disease, she said.

At present about 80 percent of medical resources in China are in big hospitals, while community-level medical services remain weak.

The centre is expected to provide strong support and guidance for the development of community medical services in China, officials noted.

(China Daily May 10, 2006)