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Hypertension in the Asia-Pacific region

Journal of Human Hypertension volume 22, pages 441–443 (2008)Cite this article

Hypertension is a major health burden and the leading cause of death in the world.1 Although hypertension is more common in economically developed countries than in economically developing ones, it is a greater population burden in the latter because of the much larger population.2 Similarly, in the Asia-Pacific region, hypertension is particularly important as this region contains at least 65% of the world's population.3, 4

In the western pacific and south-eastern Asia regions, the prevalence of hypertension ranges from 5 to 47% in men and from 7 to 38% in women, which is comparable with that in western/developed countries.3 Although the age-standardized rate of hypertension in Korea, Thailand and Taiwan is the lowest among the seven world regions defined by the World Bank,2 the incidence of hypertension is actually high,5 due to increasing obesity and metabolic syndrome.6, 7, 8 Thus, the projected 29.2% global prevalence rate of hypertension by 2025 may be an underestimate.2

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Medicine, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan

    C-E Chiang

  2. Department of Research and Education, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan

    C-H Chen

  3. Cardiovascular Research Center, National Yang-Ming University, Taipei, Taiwan

    C-E Chiang & C-H Chen

  4. Department of Public Health, National Yang-Ming University, Taipei, Taiwan

    C-H Chen

  5. I-Lan University Hospital, National Yang-Ming University, Taipei, Taiwan

    C-H Chen

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  1. C-E Chiang
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  2. C-H Chen
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Correspondence to C-H Chen.

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Chiang, CE., Chen, CH. Hypertension in the Asia-Pacific region. J Hum Hypertens 22, 441–443 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1038/jhh.2008.17

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