Statistics show that 1 out every 5 women may fall prey to a critical illness such as heart attack, cancer or stroke before reaching the age of 65. The same thing may happen to 1 of every 3 men. Therefore, the risk of catching a critical illness is bigger for men than women. Fortunately people's awareness has increased. They have started to undergo health check ups regularly. Thus, any critical illness is being able to be discovered before the disease reaches a crucial stage. Let's have a look at one of the most serious critical illnesses, heart attack.

Heart Attack

Heart attack is the second cause for most critical illness claims in the UK. Current surveys show that heart attacks have decreased significantly. This can be due to better diet, daily exercise, regular health check ups leading to discovery of the critical illness at an early stage. We'll see at some figures concerning a critical illness such as heart attack from the year 1980 to 1992. According to Coronary Heart Disease Statistics (British Heart Foundation 1997), in the year 1982 about 50 out of 10,000 men of all ages contracted heart attack. Based upon a population of 10,000, about 10 men aged between 15-44, around 110 aged between 45-64 , approximately 200 aged between 65-74 and nearly 225 aged 75 or more all suffered from the same critical illness.

In the year 1992, the rate of heart attack considerably decreased. Based upon a population of 10,000 men, around 35 of all ages had contracted heart attack. Furthermore, nearly 5 men aged between 15-44, around 75 aged between 45-64, about 155 aged between 65-74 and approximately 180 aged 75 or more all suffered from a critical illness such as heart attack.

Moreover, concerning women, According to Coronary Heart Disease Statistics (British Heart Foundation 1997), in the year 1982 about 30 out of 10,000 women of all ages suffered from a critical illness like heart attack. Based upon a population of 10,000, around 2 women aged between 15-44, nearly 40 aged between 45-64, approximately 105 aged between 65-74 and about 135 aged 75 or more all suffered from heart attack.

Additionally, the rate of a critical illness such as heart attack among women decreased even more than that of men. So, let's see at these figures recorded in the year 1992. About 25 over a population of 10,000 women of all ages suffered from heart attack. Again based upon a population of 10,000 no women aged between 15-44 had contracted this critical illness. Furthermore, nearly 25 aged between 45-64, approximately 65 aged between 65-74 and about 110 aged 75 or plus had all been diagnosed with the critical illness known as heart attack.

The decrease over this period of 10 years was 3.6 percent. As seen, this critical illness had decreased much among women than men. The reason is that men may have worked longer hours, possibly in stressful environments. Thus, time for exercise and dieting may have been a limited factor. At that stage, someone's chance to suffer from any critical illness could be elevated. Therefore, getting a critical illness cover could be an important move to secure your future.