One in 10 over 40s has type 2 diabetes, charity reveals

New figures from charity Diabetes UK suggest one in ten people aged over 40 now has type 2 diabetes.
The charity has estimated 3.8m people in the UK have diabetes, with 90% of these cases estimated to be type 2 diabetes.
An estimated one million more people are undiagnosed, and by 2030 around 5.5 million will have type 2 diabetes, Diabetes UK has said.
With a further 12.3 million people in the UK at risk of developing diabetes, it is imperative that action should be taken to reduce these rates.
There is no cure for type 1 diabetes, an autoimmune disease which most commonly develops among children. However, people with type 2 diabetes are able to put the condition into remission by cutting out foods high in sugar and adopting a low carb diet.
Our award-winning Low Carb Program has helped more than 40% of people with type 2 diabetes who start the program on medication eliminate a drug from their regime after one year.
Two in three adults in the UK are now overweight or obese, and Diabetes UK has urged people who are aged 40 or over to receive a free NHS health check to predict their diabetes risk.
Professor Jonathan Valabhji, NHS national clinical director for diabetes and obesity, said: “The growing obesity epidemic is dangerous for the nation’s overall health and worrying for the NHS, fuelling growing numbers of people with type 2 diabetes as well as costing taxpayers billions every year.”
The NHS expanded its Type 2 Diabetes Prevention Programme in 2018 in order for 200,000 people to learn how to reduce their risk of type 2 diabetes. Meanwhile the government launched its sugar tax last year, as part of its childhood obesity strategy, in a bid to crack down on rates of obesity and type 2 diabetes, particularly among younger people.
Earlier this year the NHS Long Term Plan set out its directive to prevent type 2 diabetes and improve health services.
Prof Valabhji added: “This is exactly why the NHS Long Term Plan sets out radical action to tackle this growing problem by expanding the NHS Type 2 Diabetes Prevention Programme so that 200,000 people every year can benefit and introducing a pilot of very low calorie diets that have been shown to put type 2 diabetes into remission in a significant proportion of those that already have it.”