The average life expectancy of Belarusians will exceed 74 years in 2017, BelTA learned from Belarusian Healthcare Minister Valery Malashko.

The official noted: “We've been noticing positive trends in the development of demographic processes. In 2017 the life expectancy of the Belarus population will exceed 74 years. Trends registered in the first quarter of the year allow us to say so.”

Valery Malashko noted that accomplishments of Belarusian healthcare are obvious: medical technologies are getting better and better as well as the system designed to take care of people's health. The government program People's Health and Demographic Security is being implemented. Its subprograms focus on preventing the main socially significant diseases.

At the same time the wide-spread occurrence of non-infectious diseases, including cardiovascular and oncological ones, remains a matter of concern. These diseases represent the main reasons for disabilities and deaths. The causes are obvious: behavior-determined risk factors threaten many Belarusians, including tobacco smoking, unhealthy eating habits, lack of physical activities, and alcohol abuse.

“At present nine out of every ten Belarusians suffer from one of the five main health-deteriorating habits. For instance, every other Belarusian suffers from health problems relating to excessive body weight. The share of smokers is high — nearly 30%,” said Valery Malashko. He went on saying that in order to improve the situation it is necessary to pay attention to filling the relevant websites with content to encourage a healthy lifestyle in addition to other measures.