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Fact Sheets and At-a-Glance Reports
Heart Disease Fact Sheet
 One or more of the
following files are available in Portable Document Format (PDF).
Learn more about
PDFs.
Click here to view this document
Portable
Document Format (PDF–328K).
*Heart disease death rates are
spatially smoothed to enhance the stability of rates in counties with small
populations. Deaths defined according to the following codes from the
Classification of Diseases International. 10th Revision: 100-109, 111,
113, 120-151.
Data
Sources: CDC, National Vital Statistics System and the U.S. Census Bureau.
Heart Disease Facts
- Heart disease is the leading cause of death for both men and women.
Half of the deaths due to heart disease in 2006 were in women.1
- In 2006, a total of 631,636 people in the United States died of
heart disease.* Of the deaths that year, 26%—or more than one in every
four—were caused by heart disease.1
- In the United States, someone has a heart attack every 34 seconds.
Each minute, someone in the United States dies from a heart
disease-related event.2
- Heart disease is the leading cause of death for people of most
racial/ethnic groups in the United States, including African Americans,
American Indians or Alaska Natives, Hispanics, and whites. For Asian
Americans, heart disease is second only to cancer.3
- In 2009, heart disease will cost the United States $304.6 billion.2
This total includes the cost of health care services, medications, and
lost productivity.
* For this fact sheet, the term “heart disease”
refers to several different types of heart conditions. The most common
type is coronary artery disease, also known as coronary heart disease.
Risk Factors
Nine out of 10 heart disease patients have at least one risk factor.2
Several medical conditions and lifestyle choices can put people at a higher
risk for heart disease, including:
- High cholesterol
- High blood pressure
- Diabetes
- Cigarette smoking
- Overweight and obesity
- Poor diet
- Physical inactivity
- Alcohol use
CDC's Public Health Efforts
CDC's Heart Disease and Stroke Prevention Program
Since 1998, CDC has funded state health departments' efforts to reduce
the number of people with heart disease and stroke. Health departments
in 41 states and the District of Columbia currently receive funding. The
program stresses policy and education to promote heart-healthy and
stroke-free living and working conditions.
Women and Heart Disease: An Atlas of Racial and Ethnic
Disparities in Mortality and
Men and Heart Disease: An Atlas of
Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Mortality
These two publications present national and state maps depicting
disparities in county-level heart disease death rates among the five
largest U.S. racial and ethnic groups. This information can help
government agencies and communities tailor prevention policies and
programs to areas with the greatest burden of heart disease. Interactive
versions of the atlases are available at
http://www.cdc.gov/dhdsp/maps/.
A Public Health Action Plan to Prevent Heart Disease and Stroke
These recommendations—the result of a far-reaching collaboration—help guide
the nation's heart disease and stroke prevention efforts. A national forum
of experts committed themselves to preventing disease rather than treating
it and to transforming public health agencies into effective agents of
change. CDC convenes the National Forum for Heart Disease and Stroke
Prevention and implements the Plan.
WISEWOMAN
CDC funds 21 WISEWOMAN projects in 19 states and two tribal organizations.
WISEWOMAN helps women with little or no health insurance reduce their risk
for heart disease, stroke, and other chronic diseases. The program assists
women age 40 to 64 in improving their diet, physical activity, and other
behaviors. WISEWOMAN also provides cholesterol tests and other screening.
For More Information
For more information on heart disease, visit the following Web sites.
Resources
- Heron MP, Hoyert DL, Murphy SL, Xu JQ, Kochanek KD, Tejada-Vera B.
Deaths:
Final data for 2006 [PDF–2.3M]. National Vital Statistics Reports;
57(14). Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics.
2009.
- Lloyd-Jones D, Adams R, Carnethon M, et al.
Heart Disease and Stroke Statistics—2009 Update. A Report from the
American Heart Association Statistics Committee and Stroke Statistics
Subcommittee.* Circulation. 2009;119:e21-e181.
- Heron MP.
Deaths:
Leading causes for 2004 [PDF–3.2M]. National Vital Statistics
Reports; Vol. 56 No. 5. Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health
Statistics. 2007.
*Links to non–Federal organizations are provided solely as a service to our users. Links do not constitute an endorsement of any organization by CDC or the Federal Government, and none should be inferred. The CDC is not responsible for the content of the individual organization Web pages found at this link.
Page last reviewed: November 10, 2009
Page last modified: November 10, 2009
Content source: Division for Heart Disease and Stroke
Prevention,
National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and
Health Promotion |
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