For quite some time Diabetes has been one of the leading causes of severe illness and linked to many deaths throughout the world with the U.S. leading the way until recently when the UK took the lead in the numbers of individuals with diabetes. Most of the rise in diabetes in both countries are attributed to obesity.
Type 1 Diabetes comes on usually during pre-teen and teen years. There is too much glucose in the blood and it can make you ill. Type 2 diabetes usually comes on gradually, often after the age of 35 or 40, however those figures are getting lower and lower. People who are extremely overweight are most likely to get Type 2 Diabetes.
Researchers have found that diabetes is affecting more and more people and more and more are being diagnosed in the UK, the US and other developed countries. Using a large database of medical records, studies were done on nearly 2 million people with diabetes in the UK. The studies showed that in 1996 in the UK, there was nearly 3% of UK citizens with diabetes. By 2005 there was an overall increase of 54%, with type 2 diabetes being up over 66%.
The researchers have also looked at the rise of diabetes in both countries over the past decade. Diabetes has increased in the US approximately 41% and 66% in the UK. The difference in the two countries could be that campaigns and research to deal with diabetes in the US has been going on longer than in the UK, creating an awareness and various programs to help control diabetes sooner in the US.
Regardless, it is important and essential that research continues, programs continue and awareness of how to avoid, treat and control diabetes also continue, no matter where it takes hold anywhere in the world.
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