Heart disease is the leading cause of morbidity and mortality in the United States, accounting for 50 percent of deaths each year. This amounts to about 1.5 million heart attacks, of which 500,000 are fatal.
Cardiovascular disease is a disease of lifestyle , and therefore largely preventable.
In the past 15 years, deaths from heart attacks have been reduced 25 percent and from strokes by 50 percent. Our stressful, almost-mad lifestyle, unfortunately, has not changed much. Medical research into heart attacks has been mostly directed at men. Not so . After the protective effects of estrogen drop after menopause, women are just as likely as men to have heart attacks.