KARACHI: Pakistan will have the fourth largest population of diabetic patients in the world by 2030 if the country fails to check the rate at which the disease has been spreading.

According to an estimate of the International Diabetes Federation, about 89,000 deaths of men and women occur every year in the country because of diabetes-related complications.

These were the views of senior health experts at a ‘diabetes awareness walk’ organised by the National Institute of Diabetes and Endocrinology (NIDE) on the Ojha campus of the Dow University of Health Sciences on Sunday.

The walk was part of programmes being organised to observe World Diabetes Day on Nov 14.

The theme of World Diabetes Day launched by the International Diabetes Federation (IDF) and the World Health Organisation (WHO) is ‘diabetes education and prevention’.

The day marks the birth anniversary of one of the discoverers of insulin in 1922 — a life-saving substance given to diabetic patients.

According to World Health Organisation statistics of 2005, more than 180 million people worldwide have diabetes and the number is likely to more than double by 2030, if the condition is left unchecked.

Almost 80 per cent of diabetic deaths occur in low- and middle-income countries, according to the report, experts say.

A good number of people, including faculty members of the university, students and diabetic patients, participated in the walk.

The director of the NIDE, Prof Zaman Shaikh, said that diabetes was a serious threat to public health and the leading cause of blindness, limb amputations and cardiac problems worldwide.

Quoting the IDF estimates, he said that some 285 million people worldwide would live with diabetes in the year 2010 and the figure was expected to reach 438 million by 2030.

The South-East Asian region was worst affected and it had about 58 million people suffering from diabetes and their number could reach about 101 million by 2030, registering an increase of about 72 per cent, he said.

Prof Shaikh said that Pakistan had a diabetes prevalence rate of about seven per cent in the entire population which was an alarming situation.

If steps were not taken, the figures would multiply to an extent that by 2030, Pakistan would become the fourth leading nation in the world in terms of people having diabetes.

He said that diabetes treatment was expensive and to combat the problem, all sections of society must act together under the IDF motto ‘Unite for Diabetes’.

Prevention strategies, he said, were the most important and for this lifestyle changes, including regular exercise and dietary changes, could be of the utmost importance.

That could help control blood sugar and prevent the complications in the long term, he said.

Prof Zeenat Ayub also spoke. A free blood sugar screening and body mass index test was also arranged.