Cardiovascular diseases account for the most deaths globally with ischaemic heart disease and stroke accounting for 80% of these deaths. Hypertension is the most important risk factor for these diseases and affects approximately 1.3 billion adults globally. Hypertension significantly increases the risk of heart, brain and kidney diseases and is the leading cause of death globally, claiming approximately 10.8 million lives in 2019, most of them prematurely. Globally, the number of adults aged 30–79 years with hypertension increased from 650 million to 1.28 billion in the last thirty years, with most of them (two-thirds) living in LMICs.
Even though hypertension can be easily detected through measuring blood pressure, at home or in a health centre, and can generally be treated effectively with medications that are largely considered low cost and widely available, less than half of adults with hypertension are diagnosed and treated with even fewer (approximately 1 in 5 adults) having it under control worldwide. This reveals several gaps in the treatment cascade for hypertension including awareness; diagnosis; treatment and control.
The WHO Department of Noncommunicable Diseases (NCD), in collaboration with Health Products Policy and Standards Department, are convening the next series of dialogues with the private sector to define meaningful and effective contributions to the implementation of national responses for the prevention, management and control of NCDs and the attainment of related Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) targets. This dialogue in the series, which is being held on 21 and 22 June 2022, will focus on inviting the pharmaceutical and health technology industry to strengthen its commitment and contribution to the implementation of national NCD responses and improve access to affordable, safe, effective and quality medicines and health technologies in the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of hypertension.
Improving access to antihypertensive medicines and blood pressure monitoring devices for the diagnosis, management and treatment of hypertension is multi-faceted and part of a broader challenge of ensuring access to health care. It requires a robust health system which includes good leadership and governance, adequate financing, access to information and evidence, quality service delivery, a strong health workforce, and equitable access to essential medicines and health technology products of assured quality, safety, efficacy and cost-effectiveness. Effective interventions will require enhanced collaboration and commitment for greater impact at country-level.
The engagement with the pharmaceutical and health
technology industry and its meaningful and effective contribution to the NCD
response, while giving due regard to managing conflicts of interest, is an
essential component of the response to achieve SDG target 3.4, 3.8 and 3b. This
dialogue aims to encourage inputs, commitments, and contributions from the
pharmaceutical and health technology industries to support WHO’s activities to
improve access to these life-saving medicines and health technologies for
hypertension diagnosis, treatment and control.
Objectives of the dialogue
- Provide an update on progress in the global prevention and management of NCDs.
- Provide an update on existing progress toward improving access to hypertension medicines and health technologies.
- Deepen understanding of major barriers, challenges, opportunities and solutions for low-and-middle-income countries, including humanitarian settings.
- Encourage collaboration between WHO, intergovernmental agencies, and non-State actors in accordance with WHO’s rules and policies including the Framework of Engagement with Non-State Actors (FENSA) in a meaningful way towards the development of contributions and commitments by the relevant private sector entities (manufacturers of hypertension medicines and blood pressure measuring devices).
- Share views on the preliminary set of WHO asks for the pharmaceutical and associated technology product industries.
- Discuss potential solutions towards a collaborative approach to improving access to hypertension medicines and health technologies.