Go Red for Women Campaign launched at Women's Healthcare

Go Red for Women aims to throw the spotlight on the single biggest killer of women today - cardiovascular disease (CVD). A quarter of all deaths in the UAE are caused by CVD, while globally 35% of women are living with a heart disease.

General perceptions that CVD is a 'man's illness' have no foundation but awareness of the disease among women is low - only 13% of women know that heart disease is a major threat to their health.

The Go Red for Women campaign is being run by foundations and cardiology societies in more than 30 countries worldwide. It reaches the UAE in April with the support of Dubai Health Authority and the Emirates Cardiac Society , and will be officially launched at Women's Healthcare, organised by IIR Middle East, at the Dubai International Exhibition Centre.

Supported by Elizabeth Arden and film actress Catherine Zeta-Jones, Go Red for Women urges women to take charge of their heart health, recommends policy-makers to include CVD in the women's health agenda and asks medical professionals to proactively support the prevention, diagnosis and treatment for women.

"CVD is indisputably the most serious neglected health problem for women in both the developing and the developed worlds," said Dr Nooshin Bazargani, Specialist Cardiologist at Dubai Cardiac Centre in Dubai Hospital and Board Member of the Emirates Cardiac Society. "The UAE boasts a largely educated population of women so there should be no excuse for lack of awareness of heart disease. But the figures speak for themselves - a quarter of all deaths in the UAE are related to CVD."

The UAE is not alone in its lack of education around the disease. Limited data reveals alarming knowledge gaps throughout the world. In Singapore just 8 per cent of women know that CVD poses such a threat, while in Australia among the total population awareness of women's risk drops to 3 per cent. Even in the United States, where awareness has grown partly through the success of Go Red for Women, in 2006 only just over 20 per cent of women were aware of their biggest health risk.

"The issue of women's heart health is neglected," continued Dr. Bazargani. "The persistent myth of women's invulnerability to CVD probably does much to explain the extent to which the healthcare sector ignores the grave impact of heart attack and stroke on women. As recently as the 1980s many physicians did not even believe that women developed CVD."

Visitors to Women's Healthcare, which runs alongside The Bride Show Dubai and The Arabian Home Show, will be able to pick up a Go Red for Women red dress pin from the entrances and the Dubai Health Authority stand, which they can wear to raise awareness among friends, family and colleagues. Entry fee to Women's Healthcare is 10dhs per person per day. The exhibition takes place from 23-26 April, 2008.