The Heart in Crisis
What is Cardiovascular Disease?
• Cardiovascular Disease (CVD) is a general term covering diseases of the heart and blood vessels such as coronary heart disease and stroke.
• There are risk factors that cannot be controlled like
The Heart in Crisis
What is Cardiovascular Disease?
• Cardiovascular Disease (CVD) is a general term covering diseases of the heart and blood vessels such as coronary heart disease and stroke.
• There are risk factors that cannot be controlled like age, gender and genetic make-up but there are those that can be changed by enjoying an active lifestyle and eating a healthy, balanced diet.
• Important risk factors that can be influenced by lifestyle choices include abnormal blood lipids, high blood pressure, obesity, diabetes and smoking and physical inactivity.
• 80% of the population’s attributable risks could be reduced through healthy diet, regular physical activity and avoidance of smoking.
• More than three quarters of CVD result from tobacco use, high blood pressure, high cholesterol or their combination.
• High cholesterol is one of the biggest risk factors for heart disease – yet most people don’t know they have it and there are no warning signs.
• Seven out of ten adults in developed countries, both men and women, have total cholesterol levels above the recommended 5.0 mmol/l.
Killer Heart Health Facts
• Cardiovascular disease has reached epidemic numbers and respects no borders.
• Since 1990, more people have died from coronary heart disease than any other cause.
• Heart disease and stroke kill as many women as men.
• Nearly one in three deaths is due to cardiovascular disease. It is now the leading cause of death world-wide with nearly 17.5 million people dying from this condition each year – that’s almost the population of New York state (or equivalent state in other countries), and more than the population of Switzerland and Sweden combined.
• Globally the number of deaths caused by CVD continues to increase. It is projected that the number of deaths from CVD per year will reach 20 million by 2020 and 24 million by 2030.
• Even in the developed countries where the incidence of CVD is declining the number of deaths from CVD will continue to increase due to the ageing population.
• CVD kills every year 2.5 times as many people as do all cancers combined.
• The equivalent of 120 full jumbo jets of people die of heart disease every day worldwide (400 passengers x 120 x 365=17.5 million).
• Worldwide each year the equivalent of the entire population of Beijing (15 million people)