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Disease and death in Papua New Guinea

Sirus Naraqi, Bairi Feling and Stephen R Leeder
Med J Aust 2003; 178 (1): . || doi: 10.5694/j.1326-5377.2003.tb05030.x
Published online: 6 January 2003

Infectious diseases are still the dominating cause of death

Papua New Guinea (PNG) has a population of about 5 million people, 85% of whom live in rural villages.1 Since becoming independent in 1975, PNG has experienced problems common to emerging nations of starting from a subsistence base and simultaneously seeking to achieve economic sustainability and nationhood as well as build systems of governance, defence, transport, communication, education and healthcare. Health system development has not kept pace with changing demands in PNG. Instead, primary health services have faltered, placing a heavier burden of disease on struggling secondary care facilities as opportunities for prevention and early treatment are lost because aidposts have closed or vaccination rates have fallen.


  • 1 Western Clinical School, Faculty of Medicine, University of Sydney, Nepean Hospital, Penrith, NSW.
  • 2 Port Moresby General Hospital, Papua New Guinea; and Flinders Medical Centre, Adelaide, SA.
  • 3 Faculty of Medicine, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW.


Correspondence: 

  • 1. National Health Plan: 2001-2010. Port Moresby: Department of Health, Government of Papua New Guinea.
  • 2. Naraqi S, Gena M. Mortality at the medical wards of a university teaching hospital in Papua New Guinea: Analysis of 1244 admissions. P N G Med J 1989; 32: 171-176.
  • 3. Feling B, Naraqi S. Analysis of causes of death at the medical wards of Port Moresby General Hospital. Abstract presented at the Annual Symposium of the Medical Society of Papua New Guinea, September 1997.
  • 4. Zarbo R, Baker P, Howanitz P. The autopsy as a performance measure tool — diagnostic discrepancies and unresolved clinical questions: a College of American Pathologists Q-Probes study of 2479 autopsies from 248 institutions. Arch Pathol Lab Med 1999; 123: 191-198.
  • 5. Duke T. Decline in child health in rural Papua New Guinea. Lancet 1999; 354: 1291-1294.
  • 6. Duke T, Michael A, Mgone J, et al. Etiology of child mortality in Goroka, Papua New Guinea: a prospective two-year study. Bull World Health Organ 2002; 80: 16-25.
  • 7. Gold J, Wilson A, national response to HIV/AIDS in the East-Asia Pacific Region, Washington, DC: World Bank, In press. (Background Paper, No. 2.)
  • 8. Australian Bureau of Statistics. Causes of death, Australia December 2001. Canberra: ABS, 2001. (Catalogue No. 3303.0.)
  • 9. The Australian Government's overseas aid program. Papua New Guinea. Available at http://www.ausaid.gov.au/country/papua.cfm (accessed Nov 2002).

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