Nearly 67 million Americans currently suffer from one or more forms of cardiovascular disease, including high blood pressure, coronary heart disease, rheumatic heart disease, and stroke. While many people mistakenly assume that heart disease occurs primarily in old age, studies show that 5 percent of all heart attacks occur in people under age 40, and more than 45 percent occur in people before age 65. Women as well as men are at risk. Heart attack is the number one killer of American women, surpassing even breast cancer and lung cancer. In all, heart attack and other forms of heart and blood vessel disease claim the lives of nearly half a million women each year.
Cardiovascular diseases exact an incalculable toll in human pain and suffering.
They also inflict a heavy cost on our Nation in terms of health care expenses and lost productivity. The annual costs of cardiovascular-related physician and nursing services, hospital and nursing home services, medications, and lost work due to disability total in the billions of dollars. Fortunately, the outlook is not all gloomy. The latest reports show that age-adjusted death rates for cardiovascular diseases declined slightly more than 24 percent between 1977 and 1988. Advances in both the treatment and the prevention of heart and blood vessel diseases account for much of this progress.