Dr. Kwaku Afriyie, Minister of Health, on Monday urged all Ghanaians to take an interest in their well-being and adopt healthy lifestyles by engaging in physical exercises. This, he said, would reduce the rising incidence of non-communicable diseases, which have reached epidemic proportions in the country.

He said diseases such as cancer, diabetes, hypertension and other related cardiovascular conditions, which are closely associated with sedentary lifestyles and other factors such as smoking and improper diets, are now rated among the top five causes of reported deaths at the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital.

Dr Afriyie in a speech read for him at the launch of this year's World Health Day in Accra, noted that Ghana had achieved some level of success in the control of some infectious diseases, however, the silent epidemic of non-communicable diseases were gaining grounds since conditions such as coronary heart disease now featured high among the top five causes of morbidity and mortality.

The Day, which is being celebrated under the theme, "move for health," is focusing on the upsurge of non-communicable diseases and the need to engage in more physical exercises as a means of cutting down or delaying the onset of these conditions now known as lifestyle diseases.

He said preliminary studies conducted by the World Health Organisation (WHO) indicate that sedentary lifestyles and lack of physical activity were among the ten leading causes of disability, diseases and death, accounting for some two million deaths annually.

Dr. Afriyie said the management of non-communicable diseases, which are largely chronic and incurable cost around 1.5 and 2.8 million cedis to treat, explaining that most of these diseases were very expensive to manage since about 400 million cedis was needed for renal transplant and 60 million cedis for a dialysis machine treatment, which were part of the management of diabetes and hypertension complications.

The Health Minister said about 40 per cent of non-communicable diseases could be prevented if steps were taken to curb the risk factors, which include the lack of physical activities and obesity.

The Health Ministry is embarking on a nation-wide study on the size of the risk factors in the country in order to come out with a comprehensive exercise to check the rising incidence of these diseases.