 |
The x-axis shows
life expectancy for the 'normal' life. The "standardised" maximum life span,
82.5 years for females and 80 years for males, is taken from the country with the highest
life expectancy in the world: Japan. The y-axis shows degree of disability. The 'normal'
life is quantified as the total area in the box, a combination of the number of years
lived and the quality of life, or degree of disability. From this ideal state of the world
it is possible to calculate the burden of disease caused by premature death or disability. If
for example a girl aged 5 happens to become a victim of a mine explosion causing a
below-knee amputation, and she does not die but is rehabilitated to a health state with
some loss of physical functioning, her DALY loss could be depicted as the red area in the
figure. Her loss is 77.5 years adjusted by a disability weight i. If this weight
is, say, 0.3, her loss is 0.3 x 77,5 = 23.3. |
