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Women’s Fear of Heart Disease Doubles But Breast
Cancer Still No. 1
Survey finds women moving toward reality - heart
disease is biggest killer
July 7, 2005 - Women’s fear of heart disease has
almost doubled since 2002, but breast cancer remains the single most
feared disease, according to a new survey commissioned by the Society
for Women’s Health Research and released today. Lung cancer actually
kills more women than breast cancer but does not capture the same feat
as women have of breast cancer. The increasing fear of heart disease is
more like reality, since it is the biggest killer of women.
| |
What Disease
Do Women Fear Most?*
|
Top 10 Feared Diseases |
2005 |
2002
|
|
Cancer (unspecified) |
24.0% |
27.5% |
|
Breast Cancer |
22.1% |
22.4% |
|
Heart Disease |
9.7% |
5.3% |
|
HIV/AIDS |
9.3% |
11.3% |
|
Alzheimer’s Disease |
4.6% |
2.8% |
|
Ovarian Cancer |
2.7% |
3.1% |
|
Lung Cancer |
2.4% |
2.3% |
|
Diabetes |
2.4% |
2.2% |
|
Colon Cancer |
1.6% |
1.8% |
|
Stroke |
1.2% |
0.4% |
|
|
| |
Leading Causes of Death
- U.S. Women 2002
|
1.
Heart Disease |
28.6% |
|
2.
Cancer |
21.6% |
|
3.
Stroke |
8.0% |
|
4.
Chronic lower respiratory diseases |
5.2%
|
|
5.
Alzheimer's disease |
3.4% |
|
6.
Diabetes |
3.1% |
|
7.
Unintentional injuries |
3.0%
|
|
8.
Influenza and pneumonia |
3.0%
|
|
9.
Kidney disease |
1.7% |
|
10.
Septicemia |
1.5%
|
|
|
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Some Fast
Facts |
|
| |
More women
die from heart disease each year than from breast, ovarian, and
uterine cancer combined. Heart disease is the number one cause
of mortality in women, killing more women than men each year.
• In 2002,
approximately 63,000 men and 100,000 women died of stroke.
• HIV/AIDS is the
fifth leading killer of women aged 35-44.
• Lung cancer is the
leading cancer killer of women, taking the lives of
approximately 68,000 women each year.
• Colorectal cancer
is the third leading cause of cancer deaths in women, killing
almost 30,000 women each year.
• Autoimmune diseases
are collectively the eighth leading cause of death for women
under the age of 65, but their impact on mortality is not well
captured by traditional reporting of death statistics. |
|
Fear of HIV and AIDS has declined, although AIDS
cases in U.S. women increased an estimated 15 percent between 1999 and
2003, compared to a one percent increase in men. The other notable
change centers on Alzheimer’s disease, where 4.6 percent of women fear
it most, compared to 2.8 percent in 2002.
“Women increasingly recognize that heart disease is
the biggest health threat they face over the course of their life,”
Phyllis Greenberger, president and CEO of the Society for Women’s Health
Research, said. “Through improved research, increased advocacy and
better news reporting, women and their health care providers are getting
the message that heart disease is the number one killer of women.
Although heart disease strikes women later in life than men, there are
steps we can take at all ages to reduce our risk, such as exercise and
proper diet, as well as recognize and treat the condition when it
develops.”
Heart disease kills 500,000 American women each
year, which is over 50,000 more women than men. It strikes women on
average 10 years later than men. Women are more likely than men to have
a second heart attack within a year of the first one.
Of more than 1,000 adult U.S. women surveyed, 9.7
percent list heart disease, which includes heart attack, hypertension,
and other heart-related disease except stroke, as the disease they fear
most. That is almost double the 5.3 percent noted in an identical 2002
Society survey. More than twice as many women, 22.1 percent, say they
most fear breast cancer, which is virtually unchanged from the previous
survey (22.4 percent). All cancer responses combined totaled 57.1
percent. Ovarian cancer (2.7 percent) was the second most feared cancer,
followed by lung cancer (2.4 percent).
“While the risk of breast cancer should not be
diminished,” Greenberger said, “women need to know that lung cancer
actually kills more, claiming the lives of almost 70,000 American women
each year.”
Only 9.3 percent of women say they most fear HIV
and AIDS, which is down from 11.3 percent in 2002. HIV and AIDS is the
most feared disease among African American women, but fear of it has
dropped from 34.1 to 29.3 percent. That drop may be tied to black
women’s increased fear of heart disease, which has tripled from 2.7 to
8.4 percent. Fear of AIDS in the South (8.8 percent) and West (7.7
percent) is below the national average (9.3 percent).
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Related Story |
|
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Cardiovascular Disease Kills Almost One Million, 84
Percent Senior Citizens
American Heart Association Report Says Mexican
Americans Most at Risk for Strokes
Dec. 31, 2004 - Cardiovascular disease (CVD) –
still the nation’s No. 1 killer – claimed 927,448 American lives in 2002
and approximately 84 percent of those who died were senior citizens, 65
and older, according to the American Heart Association’s Heart
Disease and Stroke Statistics – 2005 Update released today.
More...
|
|
“The Centers for Disease Control recently reported
that women in the South make up 76 percent of new HIV infections in the
U.S., but they represent just 30 percent of the nation’s population,”
Greenberger said. “Our survey should strengthen calls for greater
education on HIV and AIDS and greater access to care.”
The Society for Women’s Health Research is the
nation’s only non-profit organization whose mission is to improve the
health of all women through research, education and advocacy. The
Society encourages the study of sex differences between women and men
that affect the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of disease.
International Communications Research of Media,
Pa., conducted the survey for the Society by telephone June 22-29, 2005,
among a nationwide cross section of 1005 U.S. women aged 18 and older.
Figures for age, income, region, education, race and size of
metropolitan area were weighted where necessary to align them with their
actual proportions in the population. The survey has a 95 percent
confidence level.
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