Warren K S
Picower Institute for Medical Research, Manhattan NY 11030, USA.
Health Transit Rev. 1996;6 Suppl:393-403.
The World Development Report 1993 announced that global life expectancy was then 65. Experience in the developed world suggests that the World Health Organization's dictum, "health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being', is simply not attainable for the foreseeable future. As physical health has improved, mental problems have become more prominent and a sense of well-being has declined. Furthermore, as the population ages and medical technology improves, the cost of health care grows almost exponentially. Since the population of the developed world is continuing to age and aging is spreading rapidly throughout the developing world, knowledge is the principal way of dealing with this seemingly intractable problem: we must know, quantitatively, the age-specific causes of ill health, and we must know which means of prevention and treatment are effective. Finally, we must apply that knowledge rationally.
《1993年世界发展报告》宣称，当时全球预期寿命为65岁。发达国家的经验表明，世界卫生组织的格言“健康是身体、心理和社会福祉的完全状态”，在可预见的未来根本无法实现。随着身体健康状况的改善，心理问题变得更加突出，幸福感却有所下降。此外，随着人口老龄化和医疗技术的进步，医疗保健成本几乎呈指数级增长。由于发达国家的人口持续老龄化，且老龄化正在迅速蔓延至整个发展中世界，知识是应对这一似乎棘手问题的主要途径：我们必须定量了解特定年龄的健康不佳原因，并且必须知道哪些预防和治疗手段是有效的。最后，我们必须合理运用这些知识。
