Diabetes is a major non-communicable disease and is on the rise globally, 346 million people worldwide have the disease. Eighty percent of these people occur in low and miiddle income countries.
 
The World Health Organization (WH0) projects that the number of deaths due to diabetes will double between 2005 and 2030.

Fifty percent of people with diabetes will die of cardiovascular disease, this makes diabetes a significant cause of deaths form heart disease or stroke.

In a recent study, researchers found that diabetes plays a significant role in premature deaths from many other diseases.

Diabetes was moderately associated  with many cancers including breast, liver and lung.

For the study researchers compared people without diabetes and people with diabetes. They established the hazard ratios for:
1-Death from any cause
2-Death from cancer
3-Death from vascular disease
4-Death from other causes

The study found that diabetes was associated with death from renal disease, pneumonia, infectious diseases and many others.

The risk factors for diabetes are:
  • Unhealthy eating
  • physical inactivity
  • Overweight/obesity
  • Family history of diabetes
Read about the resarch study