There were 941,652 deaths related to heart disease and stroke in the U.S. in 2022. The data showed a slight decrease from 2021 numbers after adjusting for age, according to a Jan. 27 news release from the association.
Here are 15 things to know from the report:
Costs
- Between 2020 and 2021, the average annual direct and indirect costs for cardiovascular diseases totaled $417.9 billion.
- Between 2020 and 2021, the average annual direct and indirect costs for coronary heart disease totaled $129.3 billion.
- Direct costs for cardiovascular disease totaled $233.3 billion between 2020 and 2021, accounting for 11% of the total U.S. health expenditures — more than any other group outside of musculoskeletal system diseases.
Coronary heart disease costs represented 23%, hypertension represented 18% and ischemic stroke/transient ischemic attack represented 11% of all direct cardiovascular disease costs.
Incidence
- Between 2017 and 2020, 48.6% of adults in the U.S. had some form of cardiovascular disease. During the same time period, 59% of non-Hispanic Black females and 58.9% of non-Hispanic Black males had some form of cardiovascular disease.
Death
- The leading causes of death from cardiovascular disease in 2022 were coronary heart disease (39.5%), stroke (17.6%), other cardiovascular diseases (17.0%), hypertensive diseases (14%), heart failure (9.3%) and diseases of the arteries (2.6%).
- Between 2012 and 2022, the annual rate of deaths attributed to coronary heart disease decreased 16.9%.
- Stroke accounted for about 1 of every 20 deaths in 2022, with one person dying from stroke about every three minutes.
- In 2022, the annual rate of stroke as an underlying cause of death increased 7%.
- In 2022, the age-adjusted rate of death attributed to diabetes was 24.1 per 100,000. The age-adjusted rate of death attributed to high blood pressure was 31.5 per 100,000.
- According to data from 2023, the rate of out-of-hospital cardiac arrest survival to hospital discharge remained low, at 10.2% for all EMS-treated non-traumatic events, 15.4% for bystander-witnessed events and 18.2% for 911 responder-witnessed events.
Risk factors
- According to data collected from 2017 to 2020, about 47% of adults in the U.S. have high blood pressure, more than 72% have an unhealthy weight — of which 42% have obesity — and about 57% have Type 2 diabetes or prediabetes.
About 40% of children in the U.S. have an unhealthy weight, of which 20% have obesity.
Disparities
- Black women had the highest rate of obesity (57.9%) and Asian women had the lowest rate (14.5%).
- Hispanic men had the highest rate of diabetes (14.5%) and white women had the lowest rate (7.7%).
- Black women had the highest rate of high blood pressure at 58.4% and Hispanic women had the lowest rate (35.3%).
- “The disparities in risk and outcomes call for tailored interventions among high-risk populations,” Dhruv Kazi, MD, head of health economics and associate director of the Richard A. and Susan F. Smith Center for Outcomes Research in Cardiology at Boston-based Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, said in the release. “Simply discovering breakthrough therapies isn’t going to be enough — we have to ensure that these therapies are accessible and affordable to people who need them most.”
Read the full report here.
Editor’s note: This article was updated Jan. 28 at 10:38 a.m. CT.
