KARACHI, July 13: Some 40 per cent to 50 per cent of children inflicted with the type-one diabetes in the country fail to survive long due to delayed diagnosis and inadequate provision for proper management of the disease.

Lack of awareness, reluctance in parents to accept that diabetes may inflict kids as young as six months and failure of general physicians to take due stock of the major symptoms often expose children to serious conditions as “Ketoacidosis”, which could be life-threatening.

Type-one diabetes which is diagnosed usually among children of five to seven years is at times also registered in infants as young as six to nine months.

Paediatricians talking to APP reiterated that diabetes among children was largely treatable and timely diagnosis along with proper management could help affected to lead a healthy life.

Yet they regretted that children suffering from type-one diabetes were often brought in coma or pre-coma conditions without adequate medical intervention, which in 99 per cent of cases was nothing but regular and required dosages of insulin.

Head of the paediatric department, Aga Khan University Hospital, Prof Abdul Ghaffar Billoo, told APP that the type-one diabetes had to be efficiently tackled.—APP