
Diabetes now affects more than 4 million people in UK, charity says
The number of people living with diabetes in the UK has topped 4 million for the first time, a charity says.
Based on 2014-15 GP patient data, Diabetes UK says there are 4.05 million people with the condition, including 3.5 million adults who have been diagnosed, an increase of 65% over the past decade and around 120,000 more than the previous year. There are thought to be 549,000 with undiagnosed type 2 diabetes.
Melanie Davies, professor of diabetes medicine at the University of Leicester and University Hospitals of Leicester NHS trust, who was made a CBE in the New Year’s honours list, said that numbers with the condition were growing across the world, often outstripping estimates.
As such, she said, the 4 million figure is “not surprising but quite alarming. There are also lots of people at very high risk of developing diabetes over the next five to 10 years. The large driver is the increase in the number of people with type 2 diabetes, associated with obesity in the population.
“We know that we have an ageing population so of course there are lots of ageing people with diabetes, but we’re seeing in the [Leicester] clinic, teenagers and even children with type 2 diabetes and we wouldn’t have seen that 10 years ago. Even under the age of 30 there are many more people developing it than before and having it for a longer time, so there are more complications.”
The National Audit Office recently criticised the poor standard of diabetes care, and Diabetes UK says that unless this is remedied more people will end up experiencing potentially preventable diabetes-re
Continue
reading