Experts urge healthy living, improved education on hypertension

About one-third of adult Nigerians are living with hypertension, with only half of them aware of their status. Less than twenty per cent of those with hypertension, who are on medication, have their blood pressure controlled.

The above was the thrust of this year’s World Hypertension Day, marked yesterday, in Ilorin, the Kwara State capital. National President of Nigerian Hypertension Society (NHS), Prof. Ayodele Omotosho, told reporters that high blood pressure patients are responding positively to modern drugs. 

Hypertension is number one cause of preventable deaths worldwide. It describes a condition of sustained elevation of blood pressure above a threshold of 140 mmHg systolic and 90 mmHg diastolic in an adult.
 
The Secretary-General, Prof. Kolawole Wahab, advocated early detection as surest way of reducing complications. He noted: “The proportion of Nigerians with hypertension is high, while awareness, treatment and control rates are low, despite availability of potent drugs. About one-third of adult Nigerians are living with hypertension, with only half of them aware of their status. Less than twenty per cent of those with hypertension, who are on medication, have their blood pressure controlled. 
 
“Unfortunately in Nigeria, hypertension only announces its presence in a lot of people after complications like stroke, heart failure, heart attack or kidney failure have developed. The social and economic tolls of these complications on immediate families and the nation at large are enormous.” NHS charged Nigerians to undertake regular health checks.

It advised patients to consult for proper advice.

BESIDES, Executive Director of Nigerian Heart Foundation (NHF), Dr. Kingsley Akinroye, has deplored low awareness on the disease. He told journalists yesterday in Lagos yesterday that the awareness gap must be bridged.

According to him, hypertension stands out among the non-communicable diseases.

“There is need to promote awareness. The longer one lives, the longer one is prone to hypertension. Women are more prone to hypertension,” he observed. He said younger people are dying from the ailment, stating that the situation must be reversed.

Akinroye advised government to be up and doing in protecting Nigerians. Consequently, he said NHF would work with the incoming administration for free treatment and measurement of the disease.

Chairman, Hypertension Committee of the foundation, Prof. Basden Onwubere, noted that more than one billion people are hypertensive globally, with the figure expected to hit 1.5 billion by 2025. He said in 2021, hypertension was estimated to affect approximately 36 per cent of adults, aged 30 to 79, with a higher burden on women, put at 39 per cent.