Unemployment and cardiovascular risk indicators. Data from the MONICA survey in northern Sweden

We studied the effect of unemployment, or the threat of unemployment, on indicators of cardiovascular risk in a randomly selected cross-sectional sample of the population aged 25-64 years in northern Sweden with interviews and a health examination. In men, unemployment for more than one year correlated significantly with systolic blood pressure, serum cholesterol level, HDL-quotients, cigarette smoking and physical inactivity. In women, unemployment correlated significantly with body mass index, HDL-quotient, cigarette smoking and physical inactivity. Our results support the hypothesis that correlations between unemployment and cardiovascular disease found in other studies could be partly explained by elevated risk indicators due to unemployment.