Zhou B, Carrillo-Larco RM, Danaei G, et al. - Improvements in hypertension detection, treatment, and control have varied significantly across countries, with some middle-income countries now outperforming the majority of high-income countries. The dual approach of lowering hypertension prevalence through primary prevention and improving treatment and control is feasible not only in high-income countries but also in low- and middle-income countries.

• Despite the stable global age-standardised prevalence, the number of people aged 30–79 years with hypertension more than doubled from 1990 to 2019, from 331 million women and 317 million men in 1990 to 626 million women and 652 million men in 2019.

• In 2019, the prevalence of age-standardised hypertension was lowest in Canada and Peru for both men and women; Taiwan, South Korea, Japan, and some countries in Western Europe including Switzerland, Spain, and the United Kingdom for women; and several low-income and middle-income countries including Eritrea, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, and the Solomon Islands for men.

• Women in two countries and men in nine countries in central and eastern Europe, central Asia, Oceania, and Latin America had hypertension prevalence rates that exceeded 50%.

• In 2019, 59% of women and 49% of men with hypertension had a previous diagnosis, and 47% of women and 38% of men were treated.

• In 2019, women had a control rate of 23%, while men had a control rate of 18%.

• South Korea, Canada, and Iceland had the highest treatment and control rates in 2019 (treatment >70%; control >50%), followed by the US, Costa Rica, Germany, Portugal, and Taiwan.

• In Nepal, Indonesia, and some countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and Oceania, treatment rates for women were less than 25% and less than 20% for men.

• Control rates were below 10% for both men and women in these countries, as well as for men in some countries in North Africa, Central and South Asia, and Eastern Europe.

• Most countries' treatment and control rates have improved since 1990, but most countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and Oceania have seen little improvement.

• High-income countries, Central Europe, and some upper-middle-income and recently high-income countries, such as Costa Rica, Taiwan, Kazakhstan, South Africa, Brazil, Chile, Turkey, and Iran, saw the greatest improvements.