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maltatoday, WEDNESDAY, 1 MARCH 2017 4 News Maltese living healthiest lives in Europe, report suggests TIM DIACONO MALTESE people live on aver- age 90% of their lifespan in good health, a higher percentage than any other European country, a newly published report has indi- cated. The European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies re- port also indicates that Malta has the lowest preventable mortality rate in Europe, and that life ex- pectancy on the island (80 years for males, 84 years for females) is slightly higher than the EU aver- age. Health minister Chris Fearne hailed the report as one that re- vealed significant progress with- in the national health services since 2014. "We often cite statistics on op- erations, but the best health indi- cator for me is how we can keep our population free from dis- ease," he told a conference at the Life Sciences Park. "Malta has the highest healthy living rate and the lowest preventable mortality rate in Europe, which shows that we must do something right." The report also shows that the national health budget increased by 11.4% this year, following a 12.5% increase in 2016. Total health expenditure as a per- centage of GDP stands at 9.75%, slightly higher than the EU aver- age of 9.45%. Obesity was ranked as the prin- cipal public health problem, with 25% of the adults and 27% of chil- dren being obese – the highest rate in the EU. Diabetes and HIV also have a relatively high preva- lence compared to other Europe- an countries. The report also described binge drinking as an important health and social issue, but notes that smoking has decreased "signifi- cantly" over the past decade. Malta's ageing population is f lagged as a growing problem, with the ratio of elderly people estimated to reach 32.7% of the population by 2020 and 40.5% by 2030. The most recent data in 2012 indicates that Malta has an acute hospital bed occupancy rate of 83.2%, which is higher than the EU average. Although the number of physi- cians reached the EU average in 2013, the number of specialist physicians, dentists, nurses and paediatricians per capita remain below it. "Overall, the Maltese health system has registered remarkable progress and this is evidenced by the improvements in preventable and amenable mortality, as well as the generally low levels of un- met need," the report reads. "The main outstanding challenges for the coming period include: adapting the health system to an increasingly diverse popula- tion; increasing health system capacity to cope with a grow- ing population; implementing a redistribution of resources and activity from hospital to primary care; ensuring access to innova- tive expensive medicines whilst concurrently tackling the need to continue identifying efficien- cy improvements; and address- ing the issue of medium-term financial sustainability associ- ated with steep demographical ageing." NAO finds government entities lacking in cyber security awareness Police probing victim's private life YANNICK PACE AN IT audit carried out by the National Audit Office (NAO), evaluating the level of cyber se- curity preparedness of 10 govern- ment entities has found there is a "general lack of cyber security awareness," a lack of "data reten- tion and storage policy," in addi- tion to an absence of the observa- tion of best practices in a number of areas. The 10 entities that were au- dited are: Malita Investments p.l.c.; Malta College of Arts, Sci- ence and Technology; Malta Competition and Consumer Af- fairs Authority; Malta Enterprise Corporation; Malta Freeport Corporation Ltd.; Manoel Thea- tre; Commission for the Rights of Persons with Disability; Refu- gee Commission; Regulator for Energy and Water Services; and WasteServ Malta Ltd. It was noted that 50% of the en- tities audited did not have a soft- ware inventory, while none of the audited entities was found to have a formally written business conti- nuity and disaster recovery plan. Moreover, it was also observed that in most cases, best practices such as password complexity, password expiry, password his- tory and the need to force users to change their password upon first logon, were not being followed. "Given that 60% of all Cyber Security attacks are known to be stemming from 'insiders', the NAO recommends that user awareness is afforded greater im- portance," read the report, adding that three entities were found to not have any policies regulating the use of email and accountabil- ity on the use of internet services. Another practice that was f lagged by the NAO was the fact that, according to its report, a number of government entities were choosing to out-source their IT services, and in many cases, did not have basic information regarding their IT set up. The NAO said that the aspects of cyber security reviewed dealt with "critical issues" such as the management of IT services, confidentiality and integrity of data, cyber security awareness, antivirus protection, business continuity and disaster recovery, IT hardware and software inven- tories, physical security, server monitoring and software access control. In view of its observations, the NAO has recommended that all government entities that partici- pated in the audit review their IT operations with the support of their respective ministry Chief Information Officer (CIO). CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 It was Al- exandrova Micallef herself who found Abela's body in their bed- room, upon her arrival from the airport, where she had just landed from a trip abroad. The couple have a four-year-old son together. Sources told MaltaToday that no suspicious activity was picked up by CCTV footage. Abela's BMW, which the police could not find in Swieqi, was found last evening in Pembroke. It has been established that the victim was still alive on Sunday night, because he had been in con- tact with people, but it is under- stood that several hours elapsed before the macabre discovery was made. The police have also spoken to Abela's relatives and colleagues. Abela, father of four, was the owner of 21 Century Travel and director at Aviaserve Ltd, among other positions held in companies operating in the tourism industry. While the police have ruled out any connection to the recent crime wave, they have all but excluded any links to his business activity. Investigators suspect that more than one person could be linked to the murder. There was no sign of forced en- try to the residence in Triq il-Gizi, suggesting that the victim may have known the aggressor or ag- gressors. The police are not excluding that sexual activity was involved. Investigators at the scene of crime in Triq il-Gizi, Swieqi