Asia faces a growing burden in treatment costs due to rising numbers of patients diagnosed with cancer, as well as those suffering from stroke and dementia over the next decade.
While Asia's economic progress has led to sharply lower levels of poverty, it has resulted in social and lifestyles changes ranging from diets to increasing urban pollution, that extract an increasing toll on communities.
The World Health Organization (WHO) says in Southeast Asia, late treatment of cancer results in 1.3 million deaths a year. WHO says of the 8.8 million deaths from cancer annually, two thirds are in Africa and Asia.
Cancers, along with diabetes, cardiovascular and chronic lung diseases, were responsible for 40 million – or 70 percent of the world's 56 million deaths in 2015, WHO said.
But globally treatment costs are rising. In 2015, the spending on cancer drugs rose by 11.5 percent to $107 billion, and is forecast to rise to $150 billion by 2020 – due largely to the expense of newer and more specialized drugs.
China reported four million new cancer cases in 2016, with the national health bill set to soar “fourfold” to 12.7 trillion yuan ($1.84 trillion) by 2025, the consultants said.