Number with diabetes trebles to 4million amid obesity crisis

DIABETES cases have trebled to four million patients over the past 26 years due to the UK’s obesity epidemic, figures revealed yesterday.

Nine per cent of men and six per cent of women in England are currently diagnosed with diabetes – compared with three per cent of males and two per cent of females in 1994.

Of the more than four million Britons who have diabetes, nine in ten suffer from Type 2, which is mostly caused by poor diet. Type 1 diabetes is an unpreventable autoimmune disease that usually develops in childhood.

Diabetes occurs when blood-sugar levels become too high and it can lead to amputations, sight loss, kidney disease, strokes and heart problems. Figures from the NHS health survey, published yesterday, showed that around twothirds of the population are obese or overweight compared with just over 50 per cent a quarter of a century ago.

Five per cent of adults of a healthy weight have diabetes compared with nine per cent of those who are overweight and 15 per cent who are obese.

The survey estimates how common various health conditions are in the country each year. More than 10,000 adults and children take part.

Co-author Professor Jenny Mindell, of University College London, said: ‘Over the past few decades, diabetes has become more common in both high and low income countries. We have known for a long time that diabetes increases the risks of developing circulatory diseases and cancers. We have seen this year that it also increases the risks of serious infection and death in people infected with Covid-19.’

The report highlighted that adults living in the most deprived areas are the most likely to be obese. Four in ten women in these areas were obese, compared with one in five in the least deprived areas. Tam Fry, of the National Obesity Forum, said: ‘No government since 1994 has published any meaningful strategy to tackle obesity so no one should be surprised at the figures.

‘High levels of obesity, particularly in deprived areas, will remain for years to come since Covid-19 has killed stone dead any action which might lower them.’