Diabetes Statistics

What are the statistics on Diabetes?

• The per capita death toll was highest in the Middle East and parts of the Pacific, with more than one in four deaths in the 35-64 age range attributed to diabetes.
• There are currently more than 194 million people with diabetes worldwide. If nothing is done to slow the epidemic, the number will exceed 333 million by 2025 and the World Health Organization (WHO) and the International Diabetes Foundation say the number of diabetics worldwide will be 366 million by 2030.
• In 2003, the five countries with the largest numbers of persons with diabetes were India (35.5 million), China (23.8 million), the United States (16 million), Russia (9.7 million) and Japan (6.7 million).
• At least 50% of all people with diabetes are unaware of their condition. In some countries this figure may rise to 80%.
• Diabetes is the fourth main cause of death in most developed countries.
• Diabetes is the leading cause of blindness and visual impairment in adults in developed countries.
• Diabetes is the most common cause of amputation which is not the result of an accident. People with diabetes are 15 to 40 times more likely to require a lower-limb amputation compared to the general population.
• People with diabetes are two to four times more likely to develop cardiovascular disease than people without diabetes.
• People with Type II diabetes have the same risk of heart attack as people without diabetes who have already had a heart attack.
• People with diabetes can have a heart attack without even realising it.
• Strokes occur twice as often in people with diabetes and high blood pressure as in those with high blood pressure alone.
• For each risk factor present, the risk of cardiovascular death is about three times greater in people with diabetes as compared to people without the condition.
• By 2025, the number of people with diabetes is expected to more than double in Africa, the Eastern Mediterranean and Middle East, South-East Asia, and rise by 20% in Europe, 50% in North America, 85% in South and Central America and 75% in the Western Pacific.
• For developing countries, there will be a projected increase of a 170% of cases; for developed countries, there will be a projected rise of 42%. 1

1. Diabetes Atlas, Second Edition, International Diabetes Federation, 2003.