Our century's diseases are products of our societies. Like Sisyphus, we spend all our energy fighting banes that we created.

Infant mortality is decreasing while life expectancy and the treatment of diseases are making huge advances. But the resulting demographic transition has also brought about an epidemiological transition: we no longer die from the same diseases. The diseases of our century are the very product of our societies and our ways of life. Humans are striving to combat problems they themselves created. What explains such contradictory behavior? For nearly everything that contributes today to illness and death stems from economic development or its repercussions: an overview of contemporary diseases and an invitation to much-needed change.