Prof. dr. M.A. Hawkins

Tackling the 21st Century Goliath: The Global Diabetes Epidemic

Workshop leader: Prof. dr. M.A. Hawkins

Department: Medicine, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, New York City, USA

The World Health Organization projects that the number of people suffering from diabetes will increase from current estimates of 246 million up to 366 million over the next 20 years, with 90% of new cases occurring in developing countries. Remarkably, this prevalence is likely to surpass by about 10 times the number of people affected by HIV/AIDS. As a feature of growing urbanization in the developing world, the combination of less healthy diets with less active lifestyles is leading to a dramatic increase in diabetes. When combined with poor access to health care in these countries, this is an alarming situation.

In addition to types 1 and 2 diabetes, there is another form of diabetes that affects millions of impoverished children and young adults in developing countries, known as “malnutrition diabetes”. Characteristics of this form of diabetes include a history of malnutrition, poor health outcomes, and susceptibility to severe diabetic complications. Most patients are prescribed insulin, which is not a good solution in these settings because of its cost, perishability, and unavailability. Even when insulin is available, consistent food often is not, leading to many deaths from low blood sugar. While the statistics are striking, with millions of young patients likely affected globally, Dr. Hawkins will emphasize the impact of individual stories of patients she has known and cared for. For those with malnutrition diabetes, insulin is not necessarily the solution. If a more effective and accessible treatment is found, such as a nutritional one, this could potentially save millions of young lives.

In collaboration with the world-renowned Christian Medical College in Vellore, India and Makerere University in Uganda, the Global Diabetes Initiative is conducting research to better understand how to treat malnutrition diabetes, as well as developing education programs to equip health care professionals to appropriately treat diabetes in these settings.