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Today, November 14, marks International Diabetes Day, a day set aside to help raise awareness of diabetes worldwide.
It was created by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the International Diabetes Federation (IDF) in 1991 to highlight the global concerns posed by the disease.
November 14 is the birthday of Sir Frederick Banting, who, along with Charles Best, John J.R. Macleod, and James Bertram Collip, discovered insulin, a hormone that helps regulate blood sugar levels.
Traditionally, every couple of years, a theme for International Diabetes Day is chosen to focus on. Themes in the past included Eyes on Diabetes, Healthy Eating, and Access to Diabetes Care. This year, the theme of physical well-being, societal well-being, and mental well-being has been chosen.
Counties Manukau has the highest rates of diabetes in the country, and more than one in five (22 per cent) of all inpatients in Counties Manukau hospitals have diabetes.
Earlier this month, in Pukekohe, 17-year-old Keanu Meyer developed diabetic ketoacidosis, a potentially life-threatening form of diabetes, caused by a lack of insulin in the body. However, he was taken to Middlemore Hospital, and he was successfully diagnosed just in time.
In 2022, around 307,000 people were living with diabetes in New Zealand, with that number rising to an estimated 348,500 in 2024, with 45 new cases a day.
As well as the actual condition, it is estimated that 100,000 children are at risk of being pre-diabetic, and are at serious risk of developing diabetes.
There are approximately 26,000 people in New Zealand with type 1 diabetes, an autoimmune disease in which the immune system destroys insulin-producing beta cells in the pancreas, leading to insufficient insulin production.
An estimated 307,000 people have type 2 diabetes, which is caused by the body’s own cells not being able to use insulin properly, resulting in high blood sugar.
