Links between maternal health and noncommunicable diseases

The enormity of the health and economic challenges from noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) is now being understood as evidenced by the adoption of the Political Declaration on NCDs at the high-level meeting of the UN General Assembly in September 2011. ¹ NCDs account for 36 million deaths annually (63% of global deaths), which is expected to rise to 52 million by 2030. Four out of five (79%) of these deaths occur prematurely in low- or middle-income countries. ² In 2008, more than 1.4 billion adults aged ≥20 years (35%) were overweight; of these, 11% were obese (200 million men and nearly 300 million women). ³ Since 1980, the prevalence of obesity has nearly doubled worldwide. Over a billion people live with high blood pressure. In 2008, the global prevalence of hypertension in adults aged ≥25 years was around 40%. ⁴ Approximately 700 million people have dysglycemia (diabetes mellitus and impaired glucose tolerance [IGT]), which is projected to cross the billion mark by 2035. ⁵ The World Economic Forum has, for 2 years in a row, rated chronic diseases among the five top threats to the global economy including in the low- and middle-income countries. ⁶ According to the World Health Organization’s (WHO) report on Women and Health, high blood pressure, high blood glucose, and overweight and obesity are the leading risk factors of death from chronic conditions in women >20 years of age, accounting for 25%, 39%, and 35% of deaths in low-income, middle-income, and high-income countries, respectively. ⁷