World Heart Day
Work with your heart
Heart diseases or cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) are the world's largest killers, claiming more than17.2 million lives a year. It often affects many people in middle age, very often severely limiting the income and savings of affected individuals and their families. 80 percent of these premature deaths could be avoided by controlling the main risk factors: tobacco, unhealthy diet and physical inactivity. World Health Organisation (WHO) and the World Economic Forum have recognised the importance of employee health and decided the theme of World Heart Day 2009 (September 27) focusing it. This year's theme is "work with heart". The theme signifies the urgent need to extend health benefits to all employees in all workplaces. In particular, workers in low- and middle-income countries, where over 80 percent of deaths from cardiovascular disease currently occur, could benefit greatly from the implementation of such programmes. It takes away millions of productive lives annually posing significant threats to the vitality of our highly-interdependent global system, especially in the context of the current financial crisis. The economic consequences - driven by productivity reduction and increase in costs caused by these diseases among workforces - are dramatic. Experts suggested certain strategies to prevent and minimise the extent of heart diseases. Individuals can reduce their risk by engaging in regular physical activity, avoiding tobacco use and second-hand tobacco smoke, choosing a diet rich in fruit and vegetables and avoiding foods that are high in fat, sugar and salt, and maintaining a healthy body weight. Comprehensive and integrated action is means to prevent and control cardiovascular diseases: * Comprehensive action requires combining approaches that seek to reduce the risks throughout the entire population with strategies that target individuals at high risk or with established disease; * Examples of population-wide interventions that can be implemented to reduce CVDs include: comprehensive tobacco control policies, taxation to reduce the intake of foods that are high in fat, sugar and salt, building walking and cycle ways to increase physical activity, providing healthy school meals to children * Integrated approaches focus on the main common risk factors for a range of chronic diseases such as CVD, diabetes and cancer: unhealthy diet, physically inactivity and tobacco use * After a heart attack or stroke, the risk of a recurrence or death can be substantially lowered with a combination of drugs – statins to lower cholesterol, drugs to lower blood pressure, and aspirin. * Effective and inexpensive medical devices have been developed to treat CVDs, such as pacemakers, prosthetic valves, and patches for closing holes in the heart.
Key Messages To Protect Heart Health
Heart attacks and strokes are major - but preventable - killers worldwide. It occurs almost equally in men and women. Here are some simple but very useful measures that can largely prevent heart diseases. Take regular physical activity: At least 30 minutes of regular physical activity every day helps to maintain cardiovascular fitness and significantly reduce the chance of developing heart diseases. Doing exercise for at least 60 minutes on most days helps to maintain healthy weight. Eat a healthy diet: A balanced diet is crucial to a healthy heart and circulation system. This should include plenty of fruit and vegetables, whole grains, lean meat, fish and pulses, and restricted salt and sugar intake. Limiting your salt intake to less than one teaspoon a day helps to prevent heart attacks and strokes. Avoid tobacco use: Tobacco in every form is very harmful to health - cigarettes, cigars, pipes, or chewable tobacco. Exposure to second-hand tobacco smoke is also dangerous. The risk of heart attack and stroke starts to drop immediately after a person stops using tobacco products, and can drop by as much as half after one year. Know your blood pressure: High blood pressure usually has no symptoms, but can cause a sudden stroke or heart attack. Have your blood pressure checked. Know your blood sugar: Raised blood glucose (diabetes) increases the risk of heart attacks and strokes. If you have diabetes it is very important to control your blood pressure and blood sugar to minimize the risk. Know your blood lipids: Raised blood cholesterol increases the risk of heart attacks and strokes. Blood cholesterol needs to be controlled through a healthy diet and, if necessary, by appropriate medications. Source: WHO
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