Brits Having a Hard Time Handling Diabetes

According to new studies, it seems that hundreds of thousands of Brits with diabetes are having a hard time keeping their blood sugar levels under control. Due to this, these people are facing a higher risk of some very severe complications in the future, according to NHS.

This report does not just cover adults. In fact, young people fall into this category as well. Another report from the National Diabetes Audit 2010 of England and Wales showed that some 800,000 people have, what doctors are calling, “dangerously high” blood sugar levels. Some of the problems that can come from this include limb amputation, stroke and even kidney failure.

All of these reports have one thing in common – they show that both type 1 and type 2 diabetes cases are on the rise in the UK. Oddly enough the cases seem to be growing in young and middle-aged people. In fact, some reports suggest that some 300,000 kids have blood sugar levels that are so high that it puts them at risk of having complications now.

Of course, it is not just the diabetes that is causing problems in these kids and young adults. The fact is, people with diabetes are typically more likely to be obese than people without. That alone puts them at risk of having further health risks. Adding high blood sugar levels on top of that, and these young kids are flirting with disaster.

So far, some 2.5 million people in the UK have already been diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. It is also believed that another million people have diabetes but do not know it yet. The big increase in type 2 diabetes is, of course, linked to obesity and unhealthy lifestyle choices in people. On top of all of this, some 300,000 people have type 1 diabetes. This is a condition that typically develops in childhood.

The leading clinician on this recent audit, Bob Young, said that these results should ring some alarms in people. It shows that young people make up a quarter of all of the people who are affected with diabetes. Oddly enough, it is also this age group that has the highest potential to prevent this complication. If these risks could be reduced, a shorter life expectancy could be avoided.

The chief executive of Diabetes UK, Barbara Young, said that this report highlights the need for some very urgent action to ensure that people who have diabetes start to receive all of the basic care that they need now. If they do not, more amputations are going to start taking place. More people are going to start going blind, and people are going to start to have kidney failure. These are all very real problems that people have to deal with when they do not keep their diabetes in check.