Health authorities in Ghana’s Ashanti Region have issued a stark warning regarding the escalating number of hypertension-related deaths, labeling the condition a “silent time bomb.” Despite a marginal decrease in recorded hypertension cases from 140,260 in 2024 to 138,710 in 2025, officials express deep concern over the severe health implications and rising mortality.
Hypertension’s Growing Burden
Hypertension is now the 10th leading cause of outpatient department (OPD) attendance in the region, accounting for approximately 2.9% of all hospital visits in 2025. This indicates a significant number of individuals seeking medical attention for issues linked to high blood pressure.
The situation is even more critical when looking at hospital admissions. Hypertension contributed to 3.3% of all hospital admissions in the Ashanti Region in 2025. More alarmingly, hypertension-related complications were responsible for a substantial 10.4% of all deaths recorded in the region during the same year.
The Ashanti Regional Health Director, Dr. Fred Adomako-Boateng, highlighted the progressive increase in newly recorded hypertension cases between 2021 and 2024. Cases rose from 121,829 in 2021 to 140,260 in 2024, before the slight dip in 2025. “If you look at our OPD attendance and you are looking at the first 10 OPD attendances, hypertension in 2025 was the tenth one, and of the people visiting our hospital, approximately 2.8%, 2.85 or 2.9% were due to hypertension,” Dr. Adomako-Boateng stated.
Deadly Complications on the Rise
Dr. Adomako-Boateng emphasized that the 10.4% figure for hypertension-related deaths does not solely reflect deaths directly attributed to essential hypertension but includes fatalities from its severe complications. These life-threatening conditions include cardiac arrest, stroke, cerebrovascular accidents, cerebral ischaemia, and congestive heart failure.
“If you look at the causes of death in the Ashanti Region and you see the importance of what we are doing here, hypertension contributed 1.3%. 2025, 43 people died from hypertension. But then, if you calculate all the other factors or other complications that led to their demise or death, you see hypertension, and I’m going to just mention them. And these are hypertension-related: cardiac arrest, cerebral ischaemia, stroke, cerebrovascular accident, congestive heart failure, and heart failure unspecified; essential hypertension contributed about 10.4% of all the deaths that happened in the Ashanti Region,
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