ICMR issues guidelines for managing type 1 diabetes

New Delhi: At a time when the Covid pandemic has disproportionately affected people with diabetes, exposing them to a high risk for severe illness and mortality, the ICMR has, for the first time, released guidelines for the management of type 1 diabetes.

The burden of type 1 diabetes, or juvenile diabetes, a genetic condition that often presents itself early in life, is also increasing, the apex medical research body ICMR said on Monday. Type 2 diabetes is chiefly a lifestyle-related disease that a patient develops over time.

India is home to world's second largest adult diabetes population after China and every sixth person with diabetes is an Indian. India has nearly 95,600 cases of type 1 diabetes among children below 14 years of age, and every year around 15,900 fresh cases are being reported in this age group.

An estimated of 2.5 lakh people in India suffer from type 1 diabetes. According to health department officials, cases of type 2 diabetes among children and adolescents are on the rise and obesity is the primary reason for it. In the registry of people with diabetes with young age at onset from India, 25.3 per cent of individuals developing diabetes under the age of 25 had type 2 diabetes.

The past three decades witnessed 150 per cent increase in the number of people with diabetes in the country, the guidelines document stated. The growing prevalence of prediabetes indicates a further increase in diabetes in the near future. Diabetes in India has traversed from the high to the middle income and underprivileged sections of our society, the ICMR said.