Fact: one Australian has either a heart attack or stroke every four minutes. Together, they account for around 25,000 deaths a year.

The risk factors are well known: high blood pressure, cholesterol, smoking, diabetes, poor diet, alcoholism, lack of exercise and obesity.

What isn't known so much, though, is that socio-economic standing also has a major impact on cardiovascular health. Things like income, education, employment status and environmental factors including the availability of healthy foods, recreational spaces and social support.

New modelling led by Monash University projects that Australia's have-nots will have a 32 per cent higher chance of suffering cardiovascular events over the next decade compared with the haves.

Yet it's not just a matter of who's in the firing line, according to Associate Professor Zanfina Ademi.

"The magnitude of difference between socio-economic groups highlights the societal burden of inequity in healthcare outcomes and the urgent need to implement structural prevention strategies targeting disadvantaged groups that will in turn provide net economic benefit," she says.

"Immediate policies are needed to reduce the burden of health inequity."

Research undertaken by Prof Ademi and PhD student Clara Marquina reveals the acute healthcare costs of cardiovascular events amongst the most needy between 2021 and 2030 will translate to $183 million.

The lost productivity involved equates to $959 million.

Their calculations are based on projections for Australians aged 40-79.

The aim of the work is to inform structural interventions addressing risk factors and reduce the possibility of heart disease amongst the most vulnerable.

Cardiovascular disease remains the leading cause of death and disability worldwide.

Australian Institute of Health and Welfare data shows the cost to lives and the nation's economy is substantial, accounting for 26 per cent of deaths in 2018 and nine per cent of healthcare expenditure in 2015-16.

The Monash model provides a platform to incorporate socio-economic status into the equation by estimating which interventions will likely yield greater benefits demographically.

"The persistence of health inequities is pervasive, even in countries with universal healthcare," Prof Ademi said.

"In Australia, despite the theoretical universality of the healthcare system and interventions targeting individual risk factors such as smoking, the equity gap remains."