Cancer keeps its status as the top killer in the nation

Cancer its title as the nation's top killer last year, remaining as the leading cause of death in the country for the 23rd year in a row, the Department of Health (DOH) said yesterday.

Heart stroke, diabetes, accidents, pneumonia, chronic liver disease, kidney disease, suicide and hypertension, in that order, rounded out the top-10 last year, according to the department's statistics released yesterday. Generally speaking, officials said, the order of the top 10 did not change much from the previous year. The only changes were that heart disease and stroke switched places, while pneumonia and chronic liver disease switched spots.

More 133,000 people in Taiwan died last year, marking a 2.9 percent increase over the figure for the previous year. Seventy-five percent of the deaths were caused by one of the top-10 killers.