Progress against heart disease stalls; death rate rises

After decades of dramatic progress, the death rate for heart disease has begun to show a slight increase.

The death rate for heart disease has been declining during the past four decades due to public health campaigns, the introduction of medication to control high blood pressure and diabetes, and better medical care for people who suffer a heart attack, according to the Centers for Disease Control.

Until 2011, heart disease was set to be replaced by cancer as the number one killer in the U.S., but the decline in heart disease deaths slowed. Then, in 2015 the death rate from heart disease started rising, by 0.9 percent, keeping it as the leading cause of death in the US.

Heart disease wasn’t the only disease rising in 2015. Eight of the 10 leading causes of death increased.

These changes have had the most significant impact on life expectancy since 1997 with the overall death rate up 1.2 percent and life expectancy down to 78.8 years, according to the Wall Street Journal.

It is too early to tell whether this is just a temporary increase or the beginning of a more permanent change of direction, experts say.

Researchers from Kaiser Permanente, Northern California division of research, blame increasing levels of obesity for the rise in heart disease related deaths. The death rate for the elderly has remained relatively unchanged over time, but as obesity has increased, more middle-aged people are dying.

When compared with the early 1970s, levels of obesity have more than doubled for adults and tripled for teenagers. Obesity causes high blood pressure, high cholesterol and diabetes, all of which are major risk factors for heart disease.

Controlling the major risk factors is seen as the key to bringing heart disease related deaths back down. Cardiac rehabilitation, for people who have already suffered a heart attack, could also be used more effectively to reduce future heart-related deaths.