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Concepts & theories

DALY (Disability-adjusted life year)

DEDALY (Behinderungsbereinigtes Lebensjahr)

The Disability-Adjusted Life Year (DALY) is the central metric of the Global Burden of Disease framework. It expresses a population's health loss, including the years you might lose, as a sum of two parts. The first is Years of Life Lost to premature death (YLL). The second is Years Lived with Disability (YLD). One DALY equals one year of healthy life lost. YLL is the number of deaths times the standard remaining life expectancy at the age of death. YLD multiplies how common a condition is by a 'disability weight' (0 to 1) that reflects its severity. Murray and Lopez developed it at Harvard in 1996, with WHO and the World Bank. DALYs now drive global health priorities. GBD 2019 estimated about 2.5 billion DALYs worldwide, with cardiovascular disease, newborn disorders, and cancers leading the burden.

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