Medical News: BP is on the rise around the globe

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http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/BP_is_on_the_rise_around_the_globe/articleshow/2046410.cms

 

WASHINGTON: The numbers are a shock: Almost one billion people worldwide have high blood pressure, and more than half a billion more will harbour this silent killer by 2025. It is not just a problem for the ever-fattening Western world, either. Even in parts of Africa, high blood pressure is becoming common. That translates into millions of deaths from heart disease alone. Yet hypertension does not command the attention of, say, bird flu, which so far has killed fewer than 200 people. " Hypertension has gone a bit out of fashion, " says Dr Jan Ostergren of Sweden's Karolinska University Hospital, who co-authored a first-of-its-kind analysis of the global impact of high blood pressure. The idea: To rev up world governments to fight bad blood pressure just as countries have banded together in the past to fight infectious diseases. International heart specialists welcome the push.

" Even in the US, the majority of people with high blood pressure are not treated adequately, " says Dr Sidney Smith of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, who advises the World Heart Federation. " Look at China, look at Africa; go around the world. It is a major risk factor. " And the dangers go well beyond the heart. High blood pressure is a leading cause of strokes and kidney failure. It also plays a role in blindness and even dementia. Patients seldom notice symptoms until organs already are damaged.