'Staggering' Doubling of Type 2 Diabetes in Kids During Pandemic
'Staggering' Doubling of Type 2 Diabetes in Kids During Pandemic
This article is about two studies that found a disturbing pandemic-related increase in new cases of type 2 diabetes in kids in 2020. The larger study at Children's National Hospital in DC was of "all youth who were newly diagnosed with type 2 diabetes [...] from March 11, 2020 to March 10, 2021, and compared those data to the time period March 11, 2019 to March 10, 2020." The other was a small study in Baton Rouge, LA with a different timeframe, but similar results.
I am not shocked to read this, considering the upheaval in normal life that came with the pandemic--staying home, more screen time, less exercise, and so on. But it's very worrisome.
The incidence of type 2 diabetes in children appears to have doubled during the COVID-19 pandemic, data from two new US studies suggest, with the lead investigator of one saying she was "surprised by the staggering increase in cases of type 2 diabetes...and the increase in severity of presentation."
Findings [...] were presented June 25 at the virtual American Diabetes Association (ADA) 81st Scientific Sessions.
Although the two studies differed somewhat in the clinical parameters examined, both revealed a similar doubling of the rates of hospitalizations for type 2 diabetes among youth during 2020 compared with the same time period in 2019, as well as greater severity of metabolic disturbance.
And, as has been previously described with type 2 diabetes in youth, African American ethnicity predominated in both cohorts.
(More at link)