TAIPEI, Taiwan, Dec. 5 (UPI) -- Aboriginal men in Taiwan die on average 10 years younger than non-aborigines, a study released Friday indicated.
The study by the Cabinet-level Council of Indigenous Peoples and Taiwan Epidemiology Association, based on data collected in 2001, showed the life expectancy of aboriginal men was 63 years, compared with 73 for non-aborigines, while aboriginal women lived to 73, compared with 79 for non-aborigines.
The study also revealed a higher proportion of aboriginal people died from accidents, cirrhosis and liver diseases, and tuberculosis than non-aboriginal people.
Three times more aborigines died from cirrhosis than non-aborigines, and five times more aborigines died from tuberculosis. For aborigines living in mountainous areas, tuberculosis was even more devastating -- killing 13 times more aboriginal males than non-aborigines, the Taipei Times reported.
"A good number of the aboriginal people live in distant mountainous areas and, due to inconvenient transportation, they usually suffer from a lack of medical resources and information," council chairman Chen Chien-nien said.
