Be Part of the One Million Hearts Campaign

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), with several key initial partners, recently launched Million Hearts, an initiative that aims to prevent 1 million heart attacks and strokes over the next five years. Currently, cardiovascular disease costs $444 billion every year in medical costs and lost productivity in Americans. Building on work already underway thanks to the Affordable Care Act, Million Hearts will help improve Americans’ health and increase productivity.

Million Hearts is focused on two goals:

• Empowering Americans to make healthy choices such as preventing tobacco use and reducing sodium and trans fat consumption. This can reduce the number of people who need medical treatment such as blood pressure or cholesterol medications to prevent heart attacks and strokes.
• Improving care for people who do need treatment by encouraging a targeted focus on the “ABCS” – Aspirin for people at risk, Blood pressure control, Cholesterol management, and Smoking cessation – which address the major risk factors for cardiovascular disease and can help to prevent heart attacks and strokes.

“Heart disease causes one of every three American deaths and constitutes 17 percent of overall national health spending,” said HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. “By enlisting partners from across the health sector, Million Hearts will create a national focus on combating heart disease.”

Heart attack is consistently the leading cause of firefighter fatalities each year. Your fire department and community are made stronger when everyone at the department is heart-healthy. Find out more about how you can adopt and maintain a healthy lifestyle at www.healthy-firefighter.org.

View the full press release here. For more information about the Million Hearts initiative, visit http://millionhearts.hhs.gov. Million Hearts is a trademark of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.