Focus on heart disease

‘Tobacco and heart disease’ is scheduled to be the focus of World No Tobacco Day 2018, according to a note posted on the World Health Organization’s website.

WHO says the campaign, which is held every year on May 31, will increase awareness of the link between tobacco and heart and other cardiovascular diseases (CVDs), including stroke, which combined are the world’s leading causes of death.

And it will aim to increase awareness of feasible actions and measures that can be taken to reduce the risks posed by tobacco to heart-health.

‘Tobacco use is an important risk factor for the development of coronary heart disease, stroke, and peripheral vascular disease,’ WHO said.

‘Despite the known harms of tobacco to heart health, and the availability of solutions to reduce related death and disease, knowledge among large sections of the public that tobacco is one of the leading causes of CVD is low.’

WHO said CVDs killed more people than any other cause of death worldwide, and that tobacco use and second-hand smoke exposure contributed to about 12 percent of all heart disease deaths. ‘Tobacco use is the second leading cause of CVD, after high blood pressure,’ it said.

‘The global tobacco epidemic kills more than seven million people each year, of which close to 900 000 are non-smokers dying from breathing second-hand smoke.

‘Nearly 80 percent of the more than one billion smokers worldwide live in low- and middle-income countries, where the burden of tobacco-related illness and death is heaviest.’