Coronary heart disease and stroke deaths - United States, 2009.

Heart disease and stroke are the first and fourth leading causes of death, respectively in the United States. In 2008, heart disease and stroke were responsible for nearly a third of all deaths in the United States (30.4%), killing more than three-quarters of a million people that year. Coronary heart disease (CHD) is the cause of more than two-thirds of all heart disease-related deaths. One of the Healthy People 2020 objectives includes reducing the rate of CHD deaths by 20% from the baseline rate of 126 deaths per 100,000 population per year, to a goal of 100.8 deaths per 100,000 (objective HDS-2). The objectives also include reducing the rate of stroke deaths by 20% over the baseline of 42.2 deaths per 100,000, to a goal of 33.8 deaths per 100,000 population. Although the rates of death from both CHD and stroke have declined continuously in recent decades and the Healthy People 2010 goals for these two objectives were met among the overall U.S. population in 2004, the death rates remain high, particularly among men and blacks.