The government is urging businesses and community groups to take a more active role in tackling non-communicable diseases (NCDs), which now account for 83 per cent of adult deaths in Barbados, while costing the country hundreds of millions of dollars each year, health minister Davidson Ishmael said Wednesday.

In a keynote speech to open the Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) Council Health and Wellness Conference at the Hilton Hotel, Ishmael, Minister of State in the Ministry of Health and Wellness, issued a stark warning based on the latest figures.

The financial and human toll of chronic conditions like diabetes, hypertension, cancer, and cardiovascular disease has reached an unsustainable tipping point for the small island developing state, the minister told a packed room of delegates.