Tibetans see increasing life expectancy

LHASA - Lhamo, a 76-year-old woman living in the Wabaling community in Lhasa, capital of southwest China's Tibet autonomous region, hopes she can live to the age of 90.

Although the hardy conditions of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau make it difficult for most people to live there, local Tibetans have seen their life expectancy increase in recent years due to enhanced living standards and improved medical conditions.

Their average lifespan has risen from 35.5 years to the present 67 years, while the total population in the region has increased from 1 million to more than 3 million today.

"Eating more vegetables and having a healthy lifestyle helps us live longer," said Jamyang Tsozom, 66, a resident of the village of Korqag in Ngari prefecture.

Tsozom said he never ate any green leafy vegetables when he was a child. But people in his village have started to learn how to grow greenhouse vegetables in recent years.

"I am getting older, but healthier," he said.

Improvements in medical services have also helped to raise Tibet's average life expectancy.

The region will spend 1.42 billion yuan ($225 million) on health services in 2012, up 31.3 percent compared with last year's spending, according to a February statement from the region's department of finance.

The government will spend 630 million yuan to offer free medical services to farmers and herders and improve the medical insurance system for urban residents, the statement said.

Medical subsidies for farmers and herders reached 260 yuan per capita in 2011 and the number will increase to 300 yuan in 2012, according to the region's health department.

Paljor, a 50-year-old herder from Nyainrong county in Nagqu prefecture, was able to use the subsidies to pay for most of his medical expenses after suffering multiple fractures in a traffic accident.

"More than 80 percent of my medical expenses were covered by the region's medical subsidies," he said.

It is expected that Tibetans' average life expectancy will reach 68 years of age in 2015.