Preliminary Analysis of the Disease Burden of Islamic Populations in Low and Middle Income Countries

Objective The analysis in this paper represents the first step of a multi-phase effort to understand the disease burden, and to develop strategies for tackling the health problems of Islamic populations. In this starting phase of the analysis, an overview of the burden of disease for selected Islamic populations is presented. Criteria Used for Country Selection Countries included in the analysis comprise two categories: Muslim countries and countries which have a sizeable Muslim population. Muslim countries are defined as countries in which Muslims comprise 50 percent or more of the population. Countries which have a sizeable Muslim population 2 are countries which have 2 Million Muslims or more. Selected countries must be classified as Low or Middle Income countries 3. Measure of Burden of Disease Disease burden in the analysis is measured using DALYs (Disability Adjusted Life Years) DALYs for a disease or health condition are calculated as the sum of the years of life lost due to premature mortality (YLL) in the population and the years lost due to disability (YLD) for incident cases of the health condition. The analysis adjusts for the size of Muslim population within a country. For example, if country X has a population of 1,000,000 and a disease burden of 1000 DALYs and the Islamic population in the country represent only 50% of the country's population, we consider DALYs for this country to be equal to 500. Key Findings: Burden of Disease In the three regions under study: South and East Asia, Middle East and North Africa, and Sub-Saharan Africa, the contribution to the total burden of disease for all the Islamic population under study is not proportionate to the population size representation from each region. While Sub-Saharan Africa represents 20% of the Islamic Population under study, it represents 36% of the disease burden. On the other hand, the Middle East and North Africa represent 23% of Islamic population under study and 15% of the disease burden. South and East Asia is the largest contributor, both in terms of population (58%) and disease burden (48%). 1 The term Islamic populations and Muslim populations are used interchangeably in this document 2 We have decided to use a population size of 2 million Muslims because this was the largest number of Muslims in a country where Muslims constituted 50% of the population 3 We have used the World Bank classification systems that uses GNI 4 In …