The number of diabetes patients worldwide is set to almost triple from around 530 million to over 1.3 billion by 2050, according to an international team of doctors and scientists.
In a series of papers published by The Lancet, a British medical journal, the researchers warned that "despite increased awareness and ongoing multinational efforts, diabetes is pervasive, exponentially growing in prevalence, and outpacing most diseases globally."
One in five people in the worst-hit countries in Oceania and the Middle East could be living with diabetes in 2050, according to the researchers, who said "no country is expected to witness a decline in age-standardized diabetes rates over the next three decades."
Minorities in wealthier nations will be more likely to develop diabetes than their compatriots, the scientists predicted, while more than three-quarters of the world's diabetes patients will by 2045 be living in less well-to-do parts of the world.
The global population is expected to peak at close to 10 billion in mid-century, with most of the growth to take place in what is usually labeled low and middle-income countries.
Only 1 in 10 patients in such lower-income countries are likely to be receiving treatment, according to The Lancet, which listed 14 universities and organizations in Australia, Cameroon, India and the U.S. as contributors to the research.
Doctors have long warned that the number of diabetes patients has grown in recent decades, due to increasing consumption of processed food and the advent of relatively sedentary lifestyles compared to those of the past.
The expansion has come despite public health efforts such as sugar labeling rules and the promotion of organic food production.
