Years of life lost as the indicator of population health

The most serious problem of the current demographic development in Russia is the extremely high mortality rate, particularly in working age. While during ten years from 2000 to 2010 the natural population decrease made 5 million people, in two past years from 2013 to 2014 it was 3.8 million. Mortality rate is one of the objective indicators of population health. The main purpose of this article is to demonstrate the possibility of using the integrated index ‘years of life lost’ (YLL) for measurement, analysis and evaluation of the Russian population health. The article is based on the study, which shows that the indicator ‘years of life lost’ makes it possible to quantify the contribution of different death causes to the total amount of such losses in Russia. The research results are important for scientific substantiation of the state policy priorities in the sphere of health care, for estimation of the social and economic losses of the state from the extremely high premature mortality, for elaboration of specific programmes aimed at reduction of mortality and prevention of losses in the human and labour potential of the country.