(under 55 years and 65 years respectively for direct relatives of male and female) and obesity. "According to Martin, two thirds of the deaths from cardiovascular disease occur in developing countries. These countries, including Brazil, have a number of deaths from cardiovascular disease two times higher than developed countries. In Brazil, these diseases are found even as the leading cause of death: 27% of the deaths took place in 1994 of heart problems.Martin's intention to expose this information in the article End myths about them heart them. (World Salud, 1998, quoted by Ruy Laurenti and Cassia Maria Buchalla, conference published in the Brazilian Archives of Cardiology, Volume 76, No. 2, pgs. 99-104 in 2001) prove that there is just a myth the claim that Cardiovascular diseases are the prerogatives of areas considered most developed and rich. In fact, lack of information and access to health care not only corroborate the heart problems as statistics mask, giving this false impression that the richest countries, which account better the cause of their deaths, are more prone to problems heart.According to L. Husten (Global epidemic of cardio-vascular diseases predicted. Lancet 1998, 352:1530-42), also quoted by Ruy and Cassia in his article in the coming decades the least developed countries will suffer an epidemic of cardiovascular disease, the result of an increase risk factors arising from better economic conditions and increased life expectancy. Although this may seem a contradiction, at first, improving economic conditions lead to tasty high-fat diets and sedentary lifestyle comfortably.The next moment, access to information reshapes the way of life, leads to the consumption of healthier foods and sports. Confirming this conclusion, data presented in Rio de Janeiro in 1998, the 13th World Congress of Cardiology, by A. Achutti (Cardiovascular diseases epidemiology in Brazil), show that lower education, greater exposure to risk factors.Costa e Silva, in her dissertation at FIOCRUZ (National School of Public Health), defended in 1999, says this trend exactly "evil" of increased risk of illness and mortality from potentially preventable diseases in the population of low education and, possibly, low income and, therefore, "with less access to benefits of prevention and treatment of these diseases."Martin also knocks down the myth that cardiovascular diseases are basically diseases of man, although ischemic heart disease is less common in women before menopause. In fact, in many parts of the world, heart disease is the most frequent cause of death for women, even before 65 years of age.Another myth is questioned by Martin that heart disease is only problems of the elderly. Of course, the researcher explains that its incidence increases with advancing age, but a number of industrialized countries accounts for one third of 'heart attacks' on people under 65 years of age. In less developed countries, this situation is even more pronounced, probably due to poor quality of medical care, comment Reddy KS and Yusuf S., in the article "Emerging epidemic of cardiovascular disease in developing countries" that circulated in 1998. Laurenti Buchalla and add that this finding may be due to the difficulty of access of a portion of the population