6 Billion People Have No Access to Safe, Timely, and Affordable Cardiac Surgical Care [1]
Most surgeons practice in high income countries, even though the majority of the world’s population lives in low- or middle-income countries. There is a significant disparity between high-income and low-income countries in the number of both cardiac and pediatric cardiac surgeons. The number of nonsurgical cardiovascular surgeons—including interventional cardiologists, cardiac anesthesiologists, perfusionists, technicians, and other health workers—in low-income countries remains unclear, along with where they are distributed. A clear path exists to foster and uphold heart teams with a high socioeconomic return on investment across countries, but failing to take action means that millions of people will continue to suffer from preventable and treatable cardiac conditions each year.