Efforts are needed to reduce trends in chronic disease, Chief Minister Katy Gallagher has warned, adding that governments in two or three decades will be unable to afford the burden of disease.
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Ms Gallagher was responding to data from the Heart Foundation on Thursday that revealed about one in five Canberrans were living with cardiovascular disease.
The geographical snapshot, which was based on an analysis of the Bureau of Statistics' Australian Health Survey 2011-12, revealed that Weston Creek had the highest prevalence of heart disease in the ACT with nearly one in three adults living with the disease.
Ms Gallagher said the ACT figures of about 22 per cent of people living with cardiovascular disease were in line with national trends. She noted that Weston Creek was "probably one of the oldest in terms of demographic populations in the ACT" but she said the figures were worrying.
"I think it's clearly a reminder of the importance of addressing our community's health right across the board," she said.
"It's absolutely behind the reason why we've got the Healthy Weight Initiative that's being rolled out. We've put almost $4 million into that initiative in this year's budget.
"It is really about trying to start the shift back to encouraging people to drink water, to eat better and to do more exercise."
Ms Gallagher said the initiative was about targeting areas where people may be disadvantaged to provide education and support.
But she conceded more had to be done.
"Until we start seeing some of these trends change because of not only the human cost of walking around with that level of disease in the community and the individual cost, but the cost on the health system is just simply unaffordable,'' she said. ''Governments in 20 or 30 years' time simply will not be able to fund a health system that's dealing with this level of burden of disease."
The Heart Foundation research revealed that Woden had the highest percentage of people with hypertension and high cholesterol. Woden also had the highest percentage of overweight people at about 44 per cent, followed by Gungahlin at 40.8 per cent.
Obesity was highest in Tuggeranong at 30 per cent, followed by Belconnen where about one in four people, or 25.6 per cent, were obese.
Heart Foundation ACT chief executive Tony Stubbs said evidence showed a person's risk of having a heart attack doubled if they had three risk factors: being a smoker, not doing enough exercise and having high cholesterol.
