Canberra, July 9 (IANS) Chronic and mental conditions are having a growing impact on the health of Australians, according to a government report published on Thursday.

The comprehensive biennial report on Australia’s health for 2026 from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) found that 61 per cent of Australians, or 15.4 million people, were living with at least one chronic long-term health condition in 2022 and 38 per cent were living with two or more.

It said that Australians lost an estimated 4.9 million years of healthy life due to chronic conditions in 2024, accounting for 84 per cent of the total national disease burden.

The top five leading causes of disease burden in 2024 were all chronic conditions, including dementia, which became Australia’s leading cause of death for the first time.

Data previously released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics revealed that dementia accounted for 9.4 per cent of all deaths nationally in 2024, surpassing heart disease at 8.7 per cent.

The AIHW report said that dementia deaths rose by 39 per cent between 2015 and 2024, while heart disease deaths declined by 18 per cent in the same period. Zoran Bolevich, chief executive officer of the AIHW, attributed the rise in dementia deaths to Australia’s aging population.

According to the report, 22 per cent of Australians aged 16-85 reported experiencing mental health conditions in the last 12 months in 2022. Since 2007, the proportion of Australians aged 16-24 who reported mental health conditions increased from 26 to 39 per cent.

Despite the growing impact of chronic and mental health conditions, the report found that health outcomes in Australia are continuing to improve, with life expectancy at birth hitting 85.1 years for females and 81.1 years for males in 2022-24, Xinhua news agency reported.

It said that the five-year relative survival rate for cancer patients in Australia increased from 50 per cent in the period from 1987-1991 to 72 per cent from 2017-2021.

–IANS

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