New Delhi: Rising pollution levels and Covid-19 could have raised the number of sudden cardiac arrests (SCAs) in India by 2-3 times, a top interventional cardiologist said Wednesday.
Speaking at an event to launch a nationwide campaign to increase awareness on SCA and cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR), Dr Ashok Seth, chairman of Fortis Escorts Heart Institute, said while family history, poor nutrition, obesity, sedentary lifestyle, and lack of exercise are known risk factors for SCA, pollution and Covid have also been added to the list.
Sudden cardiac arrest is a life-threatening condition in which an individual’s heart stops functioning and may lead to sudden death.
“Nearly 70 percent of the people who have SCA can be revived if they receive CPR within 5 minutes of collapsing,” Dr Seth told ThePrint on the sidelines of the event, ‘Reset the Beat’, which has been launched in collaboration with medical technology company Medtronic India.
Cardiovascular diseases, or CVDs, are heart conditions that include diseased vessels, structural problems and blood clots. India already has a high burden of CVD deaths — according to the World Health Organization, they account for 27 percent of total deaths in the country every year and 45 percent of deaths in the 40-69 year age group.
Dr Seth said that, since the Covid-19 pandemic, a higher number of younger people are lining up in hospitals with various heart diseases.
“Covid has affected people by inflaming the coronary arteries and leading to blockages. Initially, we thought it’s happening during the pandemic itself and will subside later but we are continuing to see that people have got their heart muscles affected or have weakness in heart muscles (heart failure) or have faster heart rate,” he said.
A large study published by US researchers in the journal Nature last year had shown that, beyond the first 30 days after infection, individuals who had Covid-19 were at increased risk of cardiovascular diseases spanning several categories, including cerebrovascular disorders, an umbrella term for conditions that impact the blood vessels in the brain.
According to the US study, these risks and burdens were evident even among individuals who were not hospitalised during the acute phase of the Covid infection.
“Covid-19 has definitely made people far more vulnerable to heart diseases because up to 50 percent of the Covid patients have shown heart inflammation when investigated,” Seth said. While Covid-19 vaccines also have a small risk of side-effects, in up to 17 people/lakh population, the risk of heart ailments due to Covid vaccines would be far lower than from the infection itself, he added.
The Indian Council of Medical Research — the country’s apex body for biomedical research — is carrying out research to assess whether there’s an association between Covid-19 vaccination and growing instances of heart attacks.
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‘Don’t ignore symptoms’
While it is established that people with known heart diseases are more vulnerable to SCA, it can occur in up to 50 percent of the people without any known cardiovascular ailments, said Seth.
Therefore, while people may not need to get extensive heart health check-ups, they should know their risk factors such as hypertension, diabetes and dyslipidemia (high cholesterol), he added.
“Diabetes can exist without showing any symptoms for a long time. Hypertension and high cholesterol, too, may exist without symptoms till it’s too late,” he said, advising people to periodically undergo basic tests after consulting a physician.
“Echocardiogram is also a very good test that can be repeated every five years,” Dr Seth said.
In addition, people should not ignore symptoms such as breathlessness, the cardiologist said, adding that survival rate during a sudden cardiac arrest stands at a low 1 percent in India since it’s influenced by factors such as availability of emergency medical services, prompt bystander CPR, and access to defibrillation.
(Edited by Uttara Ramaswamy)
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