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New Orleans (pte035/14.01.2005/15:00) - Over 1.5 billion people worldwide will suffer from high blood pressure by 2025 and the world's poorest countries will be the worst affected, US researchers warn. As written in The Lancet http://www.thelancet.com , the researchers from Tulane University in New Orleans http://www.tulane.edu estimate that 75 per cent will be from developing countries. Millions will die from heart attacks and strokes in further years unless treatments and prevention strategies are employed, the scientists warn. Changes in diet and increasing levels of inactivity are cited as the two most likely reasons for blood pressures to soar in the future.
Professor Jaing He and his team pooled data from 30 different studies involving more than 700,000 people from different regions of the world. In 2000, around 972 million people had high blood pressure - a third in the developing world and two-thirds in western countries. However, based on trends, the scientists believe the occurrence of high blood pressure will increase by about 60 per cent to 1.56 billion people by 2025. The largest increase (80 per cent) will be in the developing world, with a smaller increase of 24 per cent in developed countries, the researchers say. They also predict that the countries hardest hit will include China and India, as well as regions of Latin America and the Caribbean.
"High blood pressure is an important health issue not only because of its high frequency, but also because it is a major modifiable risk factor for cardiovascular disease," said He. "Cardio vascular diseases are now responsible for 30 per cent of deaths worldwide. He also predicted there could be a worldwide epidemic of strokes and heart attacks in the future and that their 2025 projections are likely to be an underestimate of the true problem.
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