Diabetes: A ticking time bomb

One of the major health issues today is the explosion in the incidence of Type 2 diabetes which has affected nearly 250 million people worldwide.

The impact of the pandemic will be particularly felt in the Middle East, Asia and South America as by 2025, as the majority of new cases of diabetes will occur in these regions, a study warns.

Governments have considered how to take countermeasures on a war-footing and in early 2009 international experts met in Sao Paulo, Shanghai and Istanbul to learn how to respond to this problem.

Closer home in the UAE, signboards have gone up on streets making people aware of the debilitating disease. Every day there is a message sent out to people on Dubai TV and Sama Dubai, said Dr Fatheya Al Awadi, head of the endocrine unit at Dubai Hospital.

She was also the chairperson of the Emirates Diabetes Congress, which recently brought nearly 800 international experts to Dubai who studied effective ways of treatment and management of the disease.

Doctors here are calling for a nationwide screening for diabetes and for more closer coordination between the private and public sectors.

The situation is compounded by the fact that it is not only genetic predisposition that is the culprit, but the people themselves who are unwilling or unable to modify their lifestyles.

Dr Al Awadi agrees that changing habits like eating junk food or a sedentary lifestyle is difficult. Dr Aleem Mirza, medical director of MediCentres, believes awareness has to be created at the grassroots, in schools, where a healthy lifestyle can be inculcated.

The situation is grim not only in the UAE, where one million people are either diabetic or pre-diabetic, but also in the neighbouring Gulf States as Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait and Oman, which have high incidence of the ‘silent killer'.

Abdul Razzak Al Madani, president of the Emirates Diabetes Association said countries are forced to spend between 6 to 10 per cent of their health budgets to tackle the disease.

The UAE has formulated a strategic plan which will not only screen the population but also look into preventing it and bringing about better treatment and management of diabetes.

Dr Mariam Al Matroushi, director of health legislation and school health programmes in the Ministry, earlier called for more concerted efforts to avoid children getting diseases as Type 2 diabetes, cancers and heart problems in the future.

She called for legislation to control junk food advertising and give children more access to fresh fruits and vegetables. More than 50 per cent of the UAE children are obese, she pointed out.

The doctor had said that it was alarming that the price of fruit has gone up over the years while the cost of junk food has dropped. In one study, obesity was found to be the single most important predictor of diabetes.

Diabetes is a disease in which the body's cells fail to assimilate glucose from the blood. Tissues waste away as glucose-starved cells consume their own proteins. The disease is a leading cause of kidney failure, blindness and amputations in adults.

"It is a ticking bomb in our society," said a doctor.

250m people suffer from Type 2 diabetes worldwide

1m diabetic or pre-diabetic people live in the UAE

50% of obese children live in the UAE

The figures are alarming: more than a million UAE residents suffer from diabetes or are pre-diabetic, but most are unaware they have the disease. Pre-diabetes is the stage when remedial action can be taken to control one's high blood sugar.

But if at this point, there is no change in lifestyle, then one is sure to fall prey to the disease, which claims may lives every passing year.

Do you suffer from diabetes? How has it affected your day-to-day activities? What lifestyle changes were you forced to make?