Vickie Remoe Institute of Digital Communications

5 things you need to know about World Heart Day

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According to the World Heart Foundation, global health conditions like heart disease is one of the world’s most leading causes of death. Causing over 17 million deaths every year, representing 31 percent of the global death.  

In Sierra Leone, one out of every eighteen deaths is a result of heart disease. Which at the end of every year makes up 5 percent (4,464) of the country’s total deaths rate.

Likewise, per every 100,000 people of the population, there are over 260 persons living with health conditions like heart disease. And about 13 people died of heart conditions every day, with an average death of one in every two hours.  

Some of the major causes of heart disease are smoking, blood pressure, diabetes, family history, stress, obesity, etc. In Sierra Leone, there are over 640,000 people who smoke either tobacco or cigarettes every day.  

Below are 5 things you need to know about world heart day

  1. In May 2012, world leaders committed to reducing global mortality from non-communicable diseases(NCDs) by 25% by 2025. Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is accountable for nearly half of all NCD deaths making it the world’s number one killer. World Heart Day is, therefore, the perfect platform for the Cardiovascular disease community to unite in the fight against CVD and reduce the global disease burden.
  2. The term ‘cardiovascular disease’ refers to any disease of the heart, vascular disease of the brain, or disease of the blood vessel. More people die from CVDs worldwide than from any other cause: over 17.9 million every year, according to the World Health Organization. Of these deaths, 80% are due to coronary heart diseases (eg heart attack) and cerebrovascular diseases (eg strokes) and mostly affect low- and middle-income countries.
  3. Most cardiovascular diseases can be prevented by addressing behavioral risk factors such as tobacco use, unhealthy diet and obesity, physical inactivity, and harmful use of alcohol using population-wide strategies.
  4. 1 in 5 people will develop heart failure in their lifetimes. Heart failure is the number one cause of hospitalization and there are 26 million heart failure patients worldwide.
  5. High blood pressure or hypertension affects at least 1 in 4 men and 1 in 5 women over a billion people. However, only half of all people with blood pressure are aware of it.

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