Racial-ethnic groups living in a similar environment and with access to universal healthcare differed strikingly in their cardiovascular risk profiles

Chinese people have the most favorable cardiovascular risk profile, followed by whites, South Asians and then blacks. Moreover, diabetes occurred earlier in South Asian men and women, and black women than in people of white or Chinese origin. A similar racial-ethnic gradient was observed in the prevalence of heart disease (3.2% in Chinese to a high of 5.2% in South Asians) and stroke (0.6% in Chinese to a high of 1.7% in South Asians).