High blood pressure

On this page


In 2018, 4.3% of the total burden among Indigenous Australians was due to high blood pressure. High blood pressure was the 9th leading risk factor contributing to total disease burden.

These estimates reflect the amount of burden that could have been avoided if all Indigenous Australians did not have high blood pressure.

High blood pressure was causally linked to 12 diseases including 10 cardiovascular diseases, chronic kidney disease and dementia (see ABDS 2018 Risk factor estimates for Indigenous Australians data table S1).

How much burden was attributable to high blood pressure?

In 2018 among Indigenous Australians, high blood pressure contributed 62% of hypertensive heart disease, 41% of coronary heart disease, 39% of stroke, 32% of atrial fibrillation & flutter and 30% of chronic kidney disease total burden.

Note that the following visualisation displays the top 10 linked diseases due to high blood pressure by the selected measure.

This interactive data visualisation shows the burden attributable to high blood pressure among Indigenous Australians by linked disease. The main section shows a horizontal bar graph which can be customised to report data according to year, sex and measure of attributable burden. Each bar represents the attributable burden of the disease linked to high blood pressure.

How did burden attributable to high blood pressure vary by age and sex?

The burden from high blood pressure was estimated in Indigenous adults aged 25 and over. Total burden due to high blood pressure was highest among those aged 45–64.

Indigenous males experienced a greater amount of disease burden from high blood pressure than Indigenous females in all ages up to age 75 and over. Of the diseases linked to high blood pressure, coronary heart disease contributed the most burden from high blood pressure among Indigenous Australians.

This interactive data visualisation shows the amount of burden attributable to high blood pressure among Indigenous Australians by age group and linked disease. The main section shows a stacked bar graph which can be customised to report data according to year, sex, disease group and measure of attributable burden. Each bar represents the attributable burden within a particular age group. Each bar is also split into separate components with each colour representing a disease linked to high blood pressure.

How has disease burden due to high blood pressure changed over time?

Among Indigenous Australians the age-standardised rate of total burden due to high blood pressure (from all linked diseases) decreased by 45% (from 41.4 to 22.6 DALY per 1,000 population) between 2003 and 2018.  

This interactive data visualisation shows the rate of burden attributable to high blood pressure among Indigenous Australians by year. The main section shows a horizontal bar graph which can be customised to report data according to year, sex and measure of attributable burden. Each bar represents the attributable burden within a particular year due to high blood pressure.

Previous page
Next page