Cardiovascular disease in the Americas: the epidemiology of cardiovascular disease and its risk factors

Abstract

This first article of the Series about Cardiovascular Disease in the Americas summarizes the epidemiology of CVD and its risk factors, and population-level strategies in place aimed at CVD prevention. While age-standardized CVD incidence and CV mortality rates have been decreasing across in the Americas since 1990, the annual number of CVD cases and related deaths have increased due to population growth and ageing. The burden of CVD is also slowly transitioning from high-income countries in North America to middle-income countries in Latin America and the Caribbean. Trends in CV risk factor levels have been mixed, with declines in smoking and mean cholesterol counterbalanced by higher prevalence of obesity and diabetes. Population-wide strategies aimed at controlling cardiometabolic risk factors and tobacco use have been implemented with varying degrees of success. There is a need to better implement existing CVD prevention strategies in the region.

Keywords: Americas; Cardiovascular disease; Epidemiology.

Fig. 1

Age-standardized a) cardiovascular disease prevalence b) cardiovascular disease incidence and c) cardiovascular mortality in the Americas for 2021. CVD, cardiovascular disease. Data complied from the GBD 2021. This figure was created using MapChart (https://www.mapchart.net). Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0.

Fig. 2

Age-standardized incidence of cardiovascular disease and its common subtypes in the Americas, 1990 to 2021. Data are for rates in men and women combined. CVD, cardiovascular disease, N America, North America. Data complied from GBD 2021.

Fig. 3

Cardiovascular mortality rate and number of cardiovascular deaths in the Americas, 1990 to 2021. Data are for rates in men and women combined. CV, cardiovascular; N America, North America. Data complied from the GBD 2021.

Fig. 4

Diagnosis, treatment, and control of hypertension globally and in the Americas. Data compiled from the NCD Risk Factor Consortium. Lancet 2021; 398: 957–80.

Fig. 5

Amount of tobacco taxation relative to the retail sale price among countries in the Americas, 2020. Reproduced from “Report on Tobacco Control for the Region of the Americas 2022.” Washington, DC: Pan American Health Organization; 2022. Licence: CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO.

Fig. 6

Number of state-level obesity prevention policies enacted in the United States of America between 2009 and 2019. Reproduced from Cleveland LP, Grummon AH, Konieczynski E et al. “Obesity prevention across the US: A review of state-level policies from 2009 to 2019.” Obes Sci Prac; 2023. Licence: CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.